Blood Ties
by SailorMoonV
Summary: A letter from D's past returns the dark memories to thepresent, forcing him to remember the ordeal of being a prisoner in the hands of a pair of dunpeal sisters....
1. Prologue

Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust "Blood Ties"

by Troy A. Stanton note: This fanfic follows the events of the original stories "Winds of Change" and "Final Hours" (both written by me), and also incorporates a few elements from the story "Drawing Blood" by Catherine B. Krusberg. I have her permission to make use of her work as a source of material, so anything 'new' you see in here about D's past with Doris that didn't happen in the movie is most likely her original plot material.)

WARNING: This story contains graphic violence and adult content, please do not read beyond this point if you are easily offended by such things.

((Chapter One - Prologue))

It took a moment for the sound of the doorbell to register on his mind, resulting in a reflexive blink as it drew him out of his studies of what the ancient human world was like before the coming of the red moon. A second sound promptly followed the first, a very quiet grunting noise that he might not have heard had he not been a dunpeal, the half-breed child of a noble vampire and a human woman. The best of both worlds, many had murmured in the distant past, and yet the worst of both worlds at the same time.

"Galen," he said in a tone of both warning and concern, already starting to rise to his feet in the hopes that she would remain where she was. He knew he was already too late, as the quiet grunt he had heard moments earlier had been hers, but there was still hope that he might prevail this time.

"I've got it," Galen huffed calmly as she finished the somewhat ponderous process of getting out of her favorite chair and rising to her feet, the task made somewhat difficult by the moderate swelling of her abdomen.

The faintest of sighs rose up from D's chest. "You shouldn't be..." he started to say before being cut off by a dark glare from his bride.

"Spare me the chivalry, D," she grumped as she started to move towards the door. "Being pregnant doesn't make me an invalid who needs to be confined to bed for most of the day. Besides, I need to use the bathroom anyway so I had to get up sooner or later. Now relax and settle down, okay?" she added as she padded out of the study in almost near-perfect silence.

D sighed silently to himself again and slowly sat back down at the desk, casting a weary glance down at the ancient tome opened before him. The doctor in the human village had assured them that Galen was in perfect health. After admitting she knew little of dunpeal pregnancies in terms of verifiable medical facts, the doctor went on to explain that it was likely that Galen wouldn't be overly burdened by it as a fully human woman would until around the eighth or ninth month. However, the doctor sternly added in a tone that was directed at the both of them, that didn't mean she should be allowed to exert herself too hard even if it was within the capacity of her body to do so.

That had led to five months of minor and low-key arguments between them, with the protective side of D's nature trying to get her to take things easy and Galen's free-spirited nature bristling at the attempted imposition of any sort of constraints. They both understood the arguments for what they were, however, which is why neither of them took it personally in the slightest and why the 'arguments' rarely lasted for longer than a minute or two at the most.

Much to his discomfort, D found himself to be on the losing side of such discussions as of late simply because of Galen's recent tendency for subtle yet testy responses. While it was easy to chalk it up to an abundance of hormones, which is what she would admit to whenever they 'kissed and made up' later, it still nonetheless only served to reinforce his quiet but firmly-seated notion that women as a universal whole were dangerous entities because of their highly unpredictable natures. More so when they were with child...

D sighed quietly to himself yet again as he sat back, absently looking around the room that was part of the home they had constructed after growing weary of years of constant travel around the planet. All but hidden deep in a dark forest and several miles from the nearest human village, it offered them a sense of privacy and seclusion from the rest of the world that had long ago become tired of the dominating presence of vampires. He and Galen were thought to be the only dunpeals left alive, and it had been years since anyone could remember having or even hearing of an encounter with another vampiric entity.

Having been solitary for virtually all of his adult life, D had adapted to the quiet life fairly well once he learned how to relax instead of needing to keep a constant eye on every dark corner and pool of shadow around him. Galen, however, was far more socially-inclined than he was and often took short trips to the village to socialize and even indulge in a minor amount of gossip with the other women. Entrenched in their zone of comfort, it wasn't too long after the finishing touches had been put on the house that a somewhat different kind of restlessness enfolded them.

Galen was the first to give voice to the idea of becoming a mother, to try to bear a child to not only preserve their unique heritage but to also change their lives for the better. D was quite resistant at first, having dedicated not just his entire life but his very existence to ending the dark curse of vampiric evil in the world. Having Galen at his side for several years had shown him that there was still hope for their dark blood, that he didn't need to take that final step of cleansing by extinguishing her life and his own. However, it had still taken a considerable amount of conversation and effort for him to finally open up to the notion that he would not be doing a great disservice to either his past or the world by bringing a new life into being, one who would share in his dark blood and likely have the same blood-hunger.

He looked up as she returned, raising an eyebrow at the soft smile on her pale blue lips. It was her exotic beauty that tipped off any observers to the fact that she wasn't what she seemed to be. A pair of bluish-green liquid-like eyes looked back at him, seeming to soften as she approached. Her hair was a mane of blue-green, the color fading back and forth in each individual strand as if it couldn't make up its mind as it grew out. To most others she seemed to be simply a beautiful dunpeal, but D knew that the true cause of her beauty lay in her grandmother's Barbarois mutant blood.

She wordlessly held the letter out to him, a simple envelope that had been sealed with wax. The front of the letter bore only a single inked character, indicating that there had been no need to address it for delivery by others. She waited until she accepted it before leaning over to kiss him softly, their lips melding together almost instinctively for a minor eternity. Even with as long as they had been together and as often as they shared that simple but deeply intimate gesture, it never ceased to amaze them how the sensation could be so spine-tingling unique and yet offer them a level of comfort that neither of them had been able to fully express into words. "I'll be back," she said softly before she stood up straight and left the room again.

D watched her go before turning his attention to the letter, carefully studying the ink and script of the single letter 'D' on the front. It still bothered him on a subconscious level about how everyone viewed him as being a hero and a legend for ending the vampire reign, and how one only needed to put his name on a letter for everyone in the postal system to know how and where to deliver it to. Usually any such letters for them were really for Galen and held at the village tavern until she collected them, but it was not an unknown for the ones addressed to D that came from afar to be hand-delivered to their house for immediate perusal.

Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, save that the hand who had inked his name on the front had done so with a somewhat flowing script, he flipped the letter over to examine the back. The seal was a thin blob of ordinary red wax that bore no markings, suggesting that it wasn't from one of the few people he had kept in contact with since settling down. The bottom half of the envelope was covered in a series of tiny stamps and written notes, letting him know what cities and towns the letter had passed through and when. Tracing the path of such deliveries was remotely entertaining for him, having a fair idea of how much time any given letter should need to span the distance between any two cities or townships and speculating as to why a particular 'hop' was either late or early.

Westfield to New Meadow, for example, usually took three days to cross by wagon but only two by horse. Seeing that the hand-written date next to the New Meadow stamp was two days after the Westfield mark indicated that it indeed had been delivered by horse for that leg of the journey, not an overly unusual event given the tendency for the delivery carts that normally carried mail to be delayed by bad weather. However, judging from the number of cases where it had taken less time between hops than expected, it seemed that the letter had been apparently been given a high priority despite the lack of markings to ask for such speed.

((Someone's in a hurry,)) a voice said, audible in both the air around him and in the depths of his mind. ((Willowvale to Westmarch in two days?))

"Or they just think so," D replied quietly. Years ago he would have been upset and even resentful of the symbiot's intrusion into his silent thoughts, but life with Galen had a considerable mellowing effect on him. It seemed to have had an impact on the entity embedded in his left hand as well, as it more often than not kept to itself these days. D sometimes wondered if that was because of the time it had spoken up to make an ill-welcomed comment several months after his blood-marriage to Galen, only to set off a blistering tirade from his bride that to this day still made his ears burn when remembering just what she had said to it and how it had been phrased. She had apologized later for her outburst and things between them had settled into a decent friendship, but D couldn't help but notice a considerable drop in the level and pointedness of its commentary since then.

((Most other people wouldn't mind such prompt and expedient mail service) it pointed out.

"I'm not like other people," D countered, casting a glance at his hand.

((No shit?)) it replied with a deep chuckle that made his entire arm vibrate gently for a few moments. ((And here I was thinking that...))

"Enough," he said calmly as he used his right hand to break the wax seal. There was a time and a place for such banter, and even he had to admit that he more often than not had the time for it, but the delivery of the letter at such a rapid pace bothered him somehow. It was at least a full week ahead of the usual delivery times for originating in such a remote city, essentially on the other side of the continent going east as the proverbial crow flies, and he was fully aware that only gossip and bad tidings travelled at unholy speeds.

And he knew that nobody wrote to him simply to gossip.

The letter was a simple one, bearing the date it was first penned and done so in the same script as the lettering on the envelope. A cursory glance at the bottom-left edge of the envelope revealed that it has been posted the day after it was written, likely indicating that the sender had written the letter in the evening and had it sent out the following morning. Setting the empty envelope aside, he unfolded the rest of the letter and began to read.

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D -

If it means anything to you, Abelyne passed away three days ago in peaceful sleep. Her daughter said she had left behind a will of sorts, and that one of the items mentioned was that she wanted a letter to be sent to you, thanking you one final time for helping her live the life she enjoyed in peace until the very end. I told her that I would write the letter to you myself, as she and I were the same age when we went through it all together back then, and I know that I myself am not too far removed from my own eternal peace.

I know this may sound sudden to you and you may not even remember us, but deep in my heart I know that you do. I too wish to thank you for the chance to live my life as I have these past sixty years, a life that was just as you said it would be. Know that word came to us last year that you had finally found someone to open your heart to, and know your marriage was viewed by the both of us as a cause for mourning even as we celebrated it with smiles. I might have written then to wish you well, but I felt you didn't need to be bothered by a meek voice from the distant past. I only speak now because my dearest friend's voice has finally fallen silent, and so I wished to let her use my voice to pass along her final words of thanks to you. Her words, and now my own.

If it cannot be said enough, then let it rest with this much: Thank you. Thank you for saving our lives, our hopes, and for teaching us to dream once again. Thank you, D.

All my love,

April Rose

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It was several minutes before D could bring himself to fold the letter back up and rest it atop his lap on the envelope. The name had meant nothing to him until he spotted the carefully inked sigil beneath it, written in the ancient language once used by druids. The icon meant 'moon-kissed' and could be interpreted several ways depending on how it was used. But in this context, it was all too clear what it symbolized... and whom had written the letter. A distant part of his mind was absolutely amazed at how a simple thing like a name could suddenly trigger so strong of a memory that it all but blotted out his other senses while the visions replayed themselves in his mind's eye. The mental review was a blessedly brief one before he could refocus, but it was more than enough to leave him feeling a little haunted on the inside.

A startled blink and a reflexive glance upwards revealed the presence of his bride, standing in front of him with a look on her face that was as curious as it was uneasy. Perhaps she knew him well enough by now to tell at a glance how he was feeling or if something was bothering him, but being able to catch him so completely unawares was a warning sign they both knew painfully well. A lapse in focus happens to everyone, but when it happens to a hunter like D who more often than not could hear a fly passing gas in the next room over, it was a very strong indication that whatever was on his mind was not pleasant.

"D?" she asked softly, almost tenderly as she tried not to worry about the look she had seen in his dark eyes moments ago.

"Words from a forgotten friend," D assured her in a gentle but somber tone. "Nothing more."

"Not bad news, I trust," she replied as she cast a quick glance down at the folded letter. She was curious about the contents, of course, but wouldn't make any deep inquiries or otherwise press the issue if he could convince her that it really wasn't anything to be concerned with.

D's gaze followed hers down to the rectangle of parchment in his lap, the softest of sighs drifting up from his chest as he contemplated the merits of letting her read it. Not that there was anything objectionable in the letter itself, but rather the dark memories that it would disturb and the quiet but probing questions that her curiosity would compel her to gently inquire about.

Had it been any other incident like it in his past, he would have spoken about it with little more than a few moments of contemplative thought first. Even this one he would have been willing, though not enthused, to share with her, to relate a small slice of his own dark past and a source of one of the many voices that had haunted him for so long. However...

D sighed yet again as he allowed his gaze to wander slightly, looking up at the swelling of her abdomen that clearly indicated she was pregnant. Not that he was worried about emotional distress on her part or something about the telling of the story that could somehow influence their unborn baby, but that having to remember what he had said and done back then was the absolute last thing he wanted to do right now. Especially in the presence of the soon-to-be mother of his child. Not after being reminded about what had happened to him back then, when he had encountered both April and Abelyne sixty years ago...

"D?" she prodded quietly, her expression becoming more concerned with each moment that passed by them in silence.

((D, you might as well get it out of your system,)) it spoke up in what for it was a rather subdued tone. ((Not that you let it wake you up screaming in a nightmare or anything, but...))

"Enough," D said quietly, more out of simple force-of-habit than anything. He looked up as he felt her touch, the lightest of pressures on his jaw tilting his chin up so that his dark eyes met her liquid blue-green eyes. Even as he studied their flawless depths, they seemed to flicker with the faintest of red highlights for just an instant. He knew that it was becoming harder for her to keep complete control of her Barbarois blood as her pregnancy continued, her mutant heritage manifesting itself by giving her a distinctly insectoid look that also became apparent when she was severely stressed.

"Are you sure you're going to be alright?" she whispered softly. "I'm not going to pry into whatever secrets you keep locked away in your past, D, as we both have such things to deal with, but just keep in mind that I'm always here for you if you need me."

D closed his eyes briefly, wondering not for the first time why it always seemed to be so damn hard these days to keep anything from her, to hide behind the veil of armor and isolation that had served him so well for the literally countless years of his life before their lives had crossed and fused into one. "A friend has passed away," he said quietly. "Peacefully," he added, almost as an afterthought.

Galen's eyes immediately became sorrowful. "D, I'm sorry," she murmured as she carefully leaned over to give him a hug. She held onto him for a number of moments before edging back, blinking as he reached down to pick up the short letter and offer it to her. Their gazes locked for a moment before the softest of smiles brushed her lips, prompting her to lean forward once again to give her husband a tender kiss. "You sure?" she whispered, letting her lips brush against his lightly as she spoke.

"And if I said no?" he replied, causing her to blink with surprise.

"Well..." she hedged in a slightly uncertain tone.

((D, make up your mind,)) it sighed quietly.

"Quiet," both D and Galen said in the same instant. An odd moment of silence followed as they glanced at one another before a sheepish blush tinted her cheeks. "I love you, D," she purred as she picked up both the letter and the envelope. She then turned around and moved to carefully sit in his lap, prompting him to edge away from the desk to accommodate her. She waited until he had a secure grip on her weight and that she wasn't squishing anything of importance before nuzzling his cheek and unfolding the letter.

D said nothing as she silently read the delicately-inked script, wondering just how he was going to explain things to her. They had long ago forged an understanding about his past, one that easily dwarfed hers by a factor of eight if not more. She was permitted to ask him anything she wanted about his past,but he wasn't under any obligations to answer her. Any answer he gave would be truthful, of course, as it simply was not in his nature to lie or otherwise be dishonorable in any way.

He glanced over at her as she looked up from the letter, an odd sort of smile forming on her face. She wordlessly leaned over to kiss him deeply, one arm sliding behind him to both hold him and rebalance her weight in his lap. Her reaction was a puzzling one but he responded to her regardless, letting the seemingly natural affinity their lips had for one another play itself out at its own pace.

"Let me guess," she murmured softly once they finally parted enough to be able to look into one another's eyes, "You rescued them from the dungeon of a dark vampire lord?"

So it begins, D thought to himself as he took a deep breath. "Somewhat" he replied. It obviously wasn't the answer she had expected to hear, as she promptly blinked hard enough to create tiny microscopic ripples in her liquid eyes. Such a minute reaction would have gone completely unnoticed had he not been studying them intently, suspecting that he might have garnered just such a response.

"Somewhat?" she echoed in a fairly incredulous tone. "It's a yes-or-no answer, D, either you rescued them or you didn't."

He looked back at her in uneasy silence, knowing that the truthful answer would only pique her curiosity with an unusual intensity. He was fairly sure that it had already been done so, and that prolonging the inevitable was just going to make it that much more difficult to talk about later. He sighed very softly to himself and was preparing to draw in another breath to speak when it spoke up for him.

((It's complicated,)) it said with an audible sigh of its own. ((Well, it's not really that complicated once you take it apart under a microscope, but you get the idea.))

"I'm listening," Galen spoke up in a perfectly neutral tone.

It sighed again before it wiggled slightly, producing a sensation in his hand that was akin to a tap on the shoulder. ((D, you might as well speak up about it. Yes, she might laugh for the first few seconds, but honestly... who better else to share in such things than your beloved bride?))

"Enough," D muttered as he closed his eyes.

"D?" she spoke up carefully. "I promise not to laugh if you'll tell me."

"They told everyone I rescued them," D spoke up in a muted tone, almost too quiet for even Galen's sensitive hearing to detect. "That is not to say they're lying, as I doubt they would have been freed like that if it wasn't for my presence. What they didn't mention was that they had to rescue me first."

He wasn't sure what it was that he heard, just barest hint of the ghost of a whisper tickling the very edge of his hearing. It was enough to make him open his eyes and look up at her, finding a somewhat surprised look on her pale features. He didn't find any indication that she was amused in the least by the confession, a minor realization that comforted him just slightly. It was one thing to be teased amid the bonds of love that they shared, such things almost always accompanied by a distinctive twinkle in her eyes, but it was something else entirely to find humor in the blackened ashes of his past... and his pain.

Her tongue flicked out briefly, just enough to moisten her pale blue lips. Whether done out of nervousness or genuine dryness was hard to tell, but D found it to be a faintly ominous event. "D?" she spoke up quietly a moment later. "Do you think you can tell me about it? The whole story, I mean," she amended. "Context tends to be important in such cases."

"If you wish," he replied without emotion, or so he thought.

She paused as she sensed the undercurrent of emotion to his words, a deep and haunting timbre that spoke of an incredible amount of pain and suffering. "How long do you think that story would take to tell properly?" she whispered, absently chewing on the edge of her lip. She wasn't concerned with the actual length of time given their ageless lifespans, but she knew that she probably couldn't afford to spend too much time curled up in his lap like this. Or at least, not when she was six-months pregnant...

"Hours," D replied, his voice still all but devoid of warmth or feeling. It was how he used to speak when they had first met, not so much uncaring as impersonal and deeply withdrawn. Drawing him out of his shell had taken quite some time and more than a little noteworthy effort, but as with all old habits it sometimes became impossible to avoid slipping back into when it seemed that life not only had you by the balls for one reason or another but needed to have her nails trimmed back something fierce as well.

D almost blinked hard enough to be heard as he was answered with a fairly low-pitched purr, followed by a deep kiss that raised the hair on the back of his neck. A bright orange flag immediately went up in his mind, trying to warn him that she suddenly seemed to be in a playful mood. While that in of itself wasn't too much of a driving concern these days, it made very little sense for her to be inclined to be playful given his obviously darkened mood ten seconds ago. Unless, of course, she was now up to something...

"I have an idea," she purred in a husky tone. A somewhat wicked smile crossed her face as she only received an obviously wary sidelong look from him in reply. "Why don't you carry me upstairs and put me to bed? That way, we can both be resting comfortably while you tell me your story..."

It took him a moderate amount of effort not to sigh, shake his head, roll his eyes, or otherwise give any overt indication of his mild disbelief with his beloved bride. They had made love on an almost nightly basis since that first night they laid together on their way to visit the grave of her mother. Life on the road had only impacted that when it came to crossing the ocean, as she had discovered that the constant motion of the ship made her just queasy enough to not be in a mood for passion. Settling down had likewise virtually no real impact on things... or at least until she had first whispered in half-horror and half-delight one night that her period should have happened already.

The blood-test had been simple enough, and D honestly couldn't say he remembered much of the following five nights simply because his head had been spinning so hard from the realization that she was pregnant with his child. When the initial shock had worn off to the point of allowing their lives to at least try to return to normal, it had all but shocked him when she sought to make love to him. A very awkward conversation ensued, followed by her almost literally dragging him to see the doctor the following morning to explain what the 'problem' was. D then sat rather stoically through a ten-minute lecture about how to have sex during stages of pregnancy and why it was quite alright for them to do so. The return trip home had been done in perfect silence, but he had only made it perhaps six steps inside the front door before ending up one degree shy of being raped by her right then and there on the staircase. He got the message after that and their love-making returned to a somewhat normal albeit exceedingly gentle and careful degree.

"Well," she said in an off-handed manner, breaking through his veil of introspective thoughts again, "If you don't feel like carrying me upstairs, I suppose I can walk there on my own..."

A faint chuckle filled the air as D promptly stood up, scooping her up in his arms in a single fluid motion that barely disturbed her sense of inertia. The soft sound of amusement was neither his nor hers, but given the way he was holding her it would have been all but impossible for the symbiot to make any further commentary about the odd quirks and happenings that occurred within the bonds of love between the dunpeals.

"You know I love you, D," Galen purred very softly as she rested her head on his shoulder, a soft and gentle smile of both love and anticipation forming on her pale blue lips. A very faint giggle rose up from her chest as she saw the look in his eyes as he cast a brief glance at her. She knew he didn't know what to say in a situation like this and was no doubt asking himself yet again what he had gotten himself into.

Well, she told herself with a mental shrug, if he doesn't know by now, I doubt he ever will. Which just makes it all the more fun, she added with an even quieter giggle to herself that drew another uneasy look from him as he carried her up the stairs towards their bedroom.

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D cast a remotely amused look at her as she absently snuggled up against him, not so much half-asleep as joyfully immersed in the loving afterglow of their gentle love-making. Even someone as emotionally obtuse as he was could see there was an almost literal glow to her, a seemingly radiant aura of peace and love and contentment surrounding her that could dazzle a blind man.

She was curled up on her side with her back to him, making a very soft buzzing sound to herself that sounded almost exactly like a honeybee's wings. Most of her pale skin had darkened to a woodland brown coloring, a result of her Barbarois heritage unconsciously manifesting itself. The skin of her hands and feet had darkened further and started to gnarl like the gripping ends of an insect's legs, though she still retained enough mental focus to prevent them from ripping through the sheets or otherwise clawing at anything. Or anyone.

A simple kiss on her bare shoulder doubled the volume of her soft buzzing purrs, causing her to tilt her head back slightly to lean against him. The movement revealed the distinctly insectoid and angular lines of her face, a pair of sensory ridges evident on her forehead that weren't there previously. Her eyes were still three-quarters closed, but even through the slits of her eyelids he could make out the dark red and multifaceted shape of her eyes. To an outside observer she would have appeared to be more than a little alien and quite obviously inhuman, but to D she was still every bit as beautiful as she was in her human form.

It wasn't the first time she had 'slipped' into her insectoid form when highly relaxed, usually from making love but sometimes from something as simple as having her back gently scratched, but D was very much aware of how it had been happening more and more frequently since she conceived. Not that he had the slightest problem with it, as she was who she was, but they both had to be a little careful at times about where they ended up afterwards. In bed was the usual location for such things, being nice and comfortable, but more than one set of bed sheets needed to be replaced or otherwise mended following a hasty or careless movement of her insectoid form's claw-like fingertips and toes.

((D?)) she buzzed softly as she began to very carefully stretch, her voice tainted by a metallic undertone and somewhat distorted. ((You're an absolutely wonderful lover, you know that?))

He cuddled close to her, slipping one arm around her waist to lightly rest on the curve of her abdomen. "Be that as it may," he replied in a soft tone, "It still takes two to make love like that."

((I know,)) she purred as she took his hand in her own, squeezing it gently before pulling both it and him further over her body to rest against the soft swell of her breast. ((But you have to admit you're the one who's been doing all the work lately.))

"I guess the humans were right after all," D said in a calm voice, causing her to twist her head gently to look at him.

((About what?)) she inquired in a faintly cautious tone.

It took him a surprising amount of effort to keep his expression perfectly composed. "No good deed goes unpunished," he deadpanned. He watched in quiet amusement as she first blinked in slight confusion before she fully understood what he was trying to say with his rare attempt at humor. As expected, she immediately developed a case of the giggles that made her body jiggle in a most appealing fashion.

"D, don't do that," she chided him with a smile that was nowhere close to being disapproving, the lines of her face slowly smoothing out and returning to her usual human shape. "You... know it... hurts to laugh... like this" she said, gasping softly even as she continued to try to suppress the series of soft giggles that plagued her whenever he deliberately tried to be funny. He wasn't sure if she was amused by the humor itself or by the attempt, but the end result was still the same and thus more than worth the occasional effort.

He remained silent as she gingerly rolled over onto her back, cuddling up even closer to him and rubbing her cheek against his. She paused and glanced down at their naked bodies, making a slight face as she flexed her leg and saw where the bottom edge of the blankets had wound up. Sighing very quietly, she began to turn her focus inward and exert her vampiric will. Her skin seemed to turn pale all at once as she subdued her mutant heritage, returning her hands and feet to normal. She then crooked a finger at the blanket, using the power of her will to animate it just enough to make it start to crawl up her leg like a living entity.

D glanced down as he noticed the fabric move, raising one eyebrow as it continued to move upwards until it settled into place around their waists. It was a power they could both exert on inanimate objects if they focused hard enough, though it was rare that he bothered to do so as he viewed it as a sign of laziness. He wasn't going to argue with her about such a trivial thing, however, especially when he knew that she wasn't being lazy by letting her will handle such a task instead of taxing her physical body at this point.

A soft touch on his cheek caused him to look over at her, just in time to witness her eyes finish the process of melting from insectoid red to her usual liquid-like bluish-green. The look on her face was one of both tender love and open satisfaction, obviously still very much content after their love-making. Yet at the same time he thought he could see a subtle glimmer in her otherwise flawless eyes, suggesting that she hadn't forgotten about the letter.

"Something on your mind, my love?" she murmured quietly to him, letting her fingertips idly trace the contours of his lips.

"Always," he replied quietly, making sure not to accidentally nip her as he spoke.

A fairly coy smile brushed the edges of her lips. "Not this one again" she said in a fairly bemused tone. "I thought we fixed that thinking problem of yours a few years ago." It was a bit of an old joke back when his soul was heavy and his thoughts were clouded with uncertainty over the future, not just his but hers as well. That had all changed with her presence in his life, but old habits were still sometimes hard to break.

"Perhaps," he replied quietly, gazing into her eyes with a somber look.

"D," she whispered very softly as she pulled him down for a gentle kiss. "You don't have to talk about it if you truly don't want to. You know my love for you won't be changed in the slightest if you don't feel like talking about a painful part of your past."

He said nothing as he closed his eyes, once again asking himself if he really felt it was worth mentioning. The dark part of him said no, but the other part of him, the human half that had first awoken with Doris' touch and later strengthened by Leila and Galen, said that he couldn't deny his beloved bride her soft-spoken request to be given a glimpse into his darkened past that he had never deigned to mention before.

He heard a voice start to whisper quietly in his mind's ear, a ghostly memory of the past that seemed ready to haunt him like the countless voices of others in his past, voices that had all fallen mercifully silent after he had pledged his life to Galen during their quiet blood-marriage ceremony what felt like a lifetime ago. The whispering voice wasn't Doris' or Leila's or any of the other women in his past, but instead was Galen's voice, reminding him of what was first said when she asked about his thoughts of starting a family.

Enough, he told himself firmly, trying to thrust the memories from his mind before they could truly haunt him. He knew that he would have to open up and tell Galen about the incident alluded to in the letter, lest the self-doubt and second-guessing start tearing at his soul once again. It had taken him a literal eternity to silence the spectral whispers in his conscience the first time, and he would just as soon not give them the chance to return and torture his dark soul anew.

His sigh took them both by surprise, he at how loud it was and she at how heavy it seemed to be. Their eyes met for a brief instant before he allowed his to close, not wanting to let her see any more of his inner pain than he had to. "Galen..." he started to say very quietly.

"You don't have to if you don't want to," she interrupted softly, reaching up to squeeze his hand and resting her head on his shoulder.

"You know time has lost almost all meaning to me," he found himself saying in the quiet, almost empty tone he often used when speaking to others before her arrival in his life had opened both his eyes and his heart. "I don't truly remember how long ago it was, but sixty years may be about right. There were not too many nobles left then, and the growing number of human vampire hunters was starting to force the remaining vampires into hiding. One or two remained out in the open, as it were, in defiance of both them and myself. I was able to encounter one of them in his castle atop a continental ravine, a noble by the name of Baron Simon Winters. Defeating him was not the hardest battle I had ever fought, but it seemed his death was only the beginning of my troubles. While I was under the impression that I had taken care of everything when the castle began to crumble around me, I soon discovered that I had somehow managed to completely miss learning about a very important detail..."

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	2. Chains of Pain

Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust "Blood Ties"

by Troy A. Stanton note: This fanfic follows the events of the original stories "Winds of Change" and "Final Hours" (both written by me), and also incorporates a few elements from the story "Drawing Blood" by Catherine B. Krusberg. I have her permission to make use of her work as a source of material, so anything 'new' you see in here about D's past with Doris that didn't happen in the movie is most likely her original plot material.)

WARNING: This story contains graphic violence and adult content, please do not read beyond this point if you are easily offended by such things.

((Chapter Two - Chains of Pain))

She had remained motionless in the shadows for hours now, not wanting to run even the slightest risk of having her movements betray her. The sun was brushing the edges of the horizon, slowly bringing the long summer day to what appeared to be an uneventful close. And it was that very same lack of activity during the day that bothered her greatly. She knew that only a fool would try to attack the castle during the night when Baron Winters was at the height of his power, which meant that any such attack would be made during the day. And she knew, she knew that such an attack was coming today. So why hadn't it started yet?

A faint beep suddenly registered in her ears, the distinctive sound of the outermost tripwire sensor being set off on the lone road leading away from the vampire's castle perched on the edge of a truly epic canyon. The lay of the land was such that the only way to approach the castle was via a very dusty and twisted road from the east. A stone archway had been built over the road on the outskirts of the castle domain, serving as both a gateway and a watchtower. The terrain between the archway and the castle was heavily mined, making it an almost guaranteed death-sentence to try to traverse unless you did so slowly and kept to the very center of the road, thus becoming a fairly easy target.

A second beep soon followed the first, indicating that the second sensor had just been tripped. The timing between the two of them indicated how fast the target was moving, and having them go off so close together could only mean there was a fast-moving horse on the road heading towards her position.

So close to nightfall, she thought to herself as she darted towards the open crack in the stone masonry that overlooked the road. The slender shape of her rail-gun was scooped up in an instant, her fingers reflexively slipping the safety off as she started to charge the capacitors. She normally would have used a crossbow for something like this, but given the extreme tension of the situation she thought it was best to use the most powerful weapon she could to make absolutely sure that one shot would do the job. She had heard about him, of course, so she knew that the odds were slim she would be allowed to get a second shot off if things went awry.

The rail-gun beeped quietly to itself to indicate it was fully charged a bare instant before the third tripwire went off, warning her that her target was approaching the ridge in the distance. It was her intention to take the shot as soon as she could after he crested that ridge, knowing that it would take even a galloping horse a full five seconds to traverse the distance and duck under the archway where she couldn't shoot.

She braced the rifle against her shoulder and laid her cheek against the cold metal stock, closing her left eye as she peered through the target-scope with her right eye. Her quarry came into view an instant later, a dark figure riding a dark horse at a thunderous pace towards the castle. Took you long enough, she thought to herself as she exhaled and centered the cross-hairs on the figure's chest.

The pressure of her fingertip against the trigger had barely started to increase when the rider suddenly jerked hard on the reins, causing the mount to rear up and momentarily spoil the shot. That didn't bother her at all, as she knew she only had to wait that extra half-second for the horse to drop back to all fours before she could shoot again. The mount did precisely that, and she once again took a brief moment to make sure she was centered properly before starting to squeeze the trigger again.

Much to her surprise, the figure reached up and made a fierce grabbing motion, pulling apart the dark tunic. The sight of at least two buttons being popped was a minor distraction, given the way they twinkled slightly in the light of the sun as they spun through the air, but what was impossible to miss was the way the parted tunic left a pair of feminine breasts prominently bared and tinted bronze by the setting sun. The realization slammed into her mind a moment later, knowing that the target she expected was very much a man and that the bare chest she had been a quarter-second away from blowing a hole through thus most likely belonged to her older sister.

"You stupid bitch," she muttered to herself as she took her finger off of the trigger and slipped the safety back on, still peering out through the scope to try to make out any recognizable details. A truly heavy sigh rose up from her chest as the rider snapped the reins and started to charge forward again, her face quickly resolving into a familiar visage once she got close enough.

She grumbled quietly as she stepped back from the sniper niche and sat down, absently resting her rifle against her shoulder. The sound of thundering hooves reached her ears a moment later, reaching a powerful crescendo before audibly skidding to an abrupt halt. The wooden sounds that followed meant that the horse was being put into a hidden underground stable so that nobody would immediately be able to tell that the archway was currently populated.

The small access hatch at the far end of the archway's parapet seemed to explode upward as it was thrown open with a tremendous force, allowing the dark rider to scramble up onto the top of the archway. She hadn't bothered to try to close her tunic, letting her pert breasts swing freely in the warm evening air. "We've got a problem," she said without preamble as she darted halfway across the parapet, pausing only to scoop up a pair of binoculars and training them west towards both the castle and the setting sun.

"Nice one, sis," the sniper growled, causing the other woman to pause and glance over her shoulder at her. "You hauled ass across the road all dressed in black, and on a dark horse to boot. If you hadn't pulled your shirt open like that when you did, I'd have blown you halfway back to the village."

The older woman glanced down at her half-ruined tunic and sighed softly. "Yes, that just occurred to me when I rounded the bend. The horse was the only one I could find that was already saddled, but I'll take the blame for picking out the blouse this morning." She paused and looked back up as she refocused on the situation at hand. "Pearl, I think he got past us," she confessed as a weary look crossed her features.

"What?" Pearl said as she shot to her feet, her eyes widening. "You have to be joking, I've been out here all day and the sensors haven't picked up so much as a tumbleweed," she protested. "There's no way he came by here!"

The other woman sighed quietly and turned back towards the castle and looked through the binoculars again, trying to see if she could spot anything out of the ordinary. "He left his horse in the village," she said quietly. "And I spoke with three people who swore to me that they saw him themselves. He's here somewhere. He has to be," she added softly, almost too softly for her sister to hear.

"Coral, listen to me," Pearl said urgently as she gestured to the display panel imbedded in the wall. "This thing hasn't chirped once so far, and I've tested it twice. Here, watch," she added as she raised her rail-gun up to her shoulder and flipped the safety off.

Coral remained impassive as the trigger was pulled, resulting in a sharp twang of energy as a slender needle-like projectile was spat out from the end of the rifle at a truly unholy velocity. The air made a very distinct humming sound as the hyper-sonic projectile tunneled through it, moving faster than either dunpeal could follow as it traversed the full length of the minefield and sailed into the canyon on the other side. A series of strident chirps immediately started up as the network of motion-sensors was set off, drawing a line on the map that traced the precise trajectory the projectile had taken through the minefield.

"See?" Pearl said in a faintly edged tone as she silenced the alarms and reset the various sensors.

"So he didn't pass through the minefield," Coral countered gently as she cast a level look at her sister. She paused and shivered lightly as the wind gusted for a brief moment, teasing her exposed nipples with what to her felt like a warm caress. "Oooh, that was nice," she purred quietly before shaking her head to refocus again.

"Sis?" Pearl spoke up with a faint sigh. "There's no other way into the castle. Unless you want to try scaling the edges of the canyon, but he'd be a sitting duck and then some. Especially in broad daylight," she added darkly.

Coral shook her head gently. "No, he wouldn't bother with the canyons. However, he might have given the crypts in the village a try," she sighed as she continued to peer through the binoculars.

"The crypts don't go through to the castle," Pearl pointed out. "Father himself spent a century probing every single crack and corner in there. Okay, so they go pretty deep underground, but they don't go that deep or extend anywhere close to as far as they'd need to go to reach the castle catacombs."

The elder dunpeal sighed quietly and turned around to face her sister, absently leaning back against the edge of the parapet. "What if something was overlooked?" she said in a carefully modulated voice, trying to sound calm and reasonable without upsetting the other woman. "This is D we're talking about here, who knows what sort of secrets he knows? Remember, Father didn't build this castle, some other noble did quite some time ago and a lot of the really old ones have all sorts of secrets and surprises built into them. Like the room behind the fireplace in the den, for instance. Surely you remember how we... Eh?" she said as a low sound brushed the edges of her vampiric hearing, causing her to cock her head at an angle.

"Sis?" Pearl said in a quiet voice as her face became dangerously pale. "I heard it too. That... that sounded like it came from the castle."

Coral immediately turned around and held the binoculars up to her eyes, a frown forming across her face as she saw a faint plume rising up from one of the western towers. "A gunshot, perhaps?" she said absently. She blinked as she saw another plume waft up, a second soft boom reaching her ears after a brief delay. "No..." she said, her voice perfectly flat with disbelief.

"Sis?" Pearl prodded in a faintly wavering tone.

More dust plumes began to rise up from the castle towers, accompanied by a series of percussive booms that weren't powerful enough to shake the land yet were still strong enough to be clearly heard. "You've got to be kidding me" Coral moaned quietly in resignation as she lowered the binoculars, knowing what the vibrations meant. She cast a sidelong glance out of the corner of her eye as she felt a hand touch her elbow, seeming to be shaking slightly.

"Coral?" Pearl said quietly, her voice now openly trembling. "Why is the castle shaking like that?"

"Sometimes I hate being right," the elder dunpeal said softly, closing her pale yellow eyes as more plumes of dust began to rise up from the castle. The ancient edifice was soon obscured by the rising wall of dust and dirt, but the sound of creaking and crumbling stone could still be clearly heard.

"Oh, god," Pearl whimpered as a single tear formed in her aqua-blue eyes. "Sis... Father's dead, isn't he? That's why the castle is falling apart, it's because we failed and the hunter got him, isn't it?"

"You're a crafty bastard, D, I'll give you that," Coral murmured softly to herself as she continued to listen to the sounds coming from the castle in the distance. "Okay, so Father wasn't much of a warrior and was too proud for his own good, but still. Rest in peace, Father. Wait," she said as she opened her eyes and lifted her head up, glancing over at Pearl. "That means the title is my problem now, right? Baroness Winters now, am I? That might actually be a good thing, now that I stop and think about it... HEY! she yelped as she was forced to avoid a vicious punch that would otherwise have slammed into her jaw and likely knocked her completely off of the parapet. "Pearl!"

"How dare you say such a thing!" Pearl raged, her vampiric fangs bared and her eyes almost literally glowing a cherry red color. "He just murdered our father, and all you can say is that it's a good thing?"

"Pearl, listen to me for a moment," Coral said in a soothing voice. "I'm just as upset as you are over Father's death, but let's be practical about it. Yes, the castle is falling apart because he's dead, and yes, D is likely to blame for it. Now here's what I meant... if I'm the Baroness now, it means that he'll be coming for me next. You still with me?" she prodded carefully.

It took Pearl a few moments to get her rage back under control, her eyes still glowing like burning coals. "And having him hunt us down one by one is a good thing?" she snarled, seeming to still be struggling with her temper.

Coral made a dismissive gesture. "Please, of course not. However, if we do this right we can have a really, really nice welcome planned for him when he comes for me. Look, we both tried to warn Father that D was in the area, but he blew us off and look what happened," she added, making an absent gesture to the billowing cloud off in the distance.

Pearl reflexively glanced towards the source of the constant rumbles and booms of collapsing stone, her temper coming dangerously close to the breaking point once again. "He's dead," she snarled quietly to herself. "I'll rip him open with my bare hands if I have to, but I will feast on the blood in his veins before bathing in what's left of his life-force..."

"Now, now, let's not be hasty," Coral spoke up in a somewhat light tone, drawing another dark look from her younger sister. "Bathing in blood is such a waste, and we both know what happened with Carmilla. Besides, you don't want to kill him right away, Pearl. No, you want to watch him suffer for quite some time," she purred in a suggestive tone. "Just imagine staring into his eyes as he is oh-so-slowly broken on our little rack, drinking in his pain with every little fun game that you get to play with him..."

"Sis, don't do that," Pearl growled flatly, absently reaching down to rub the back of her left hand. She knew it tended to ache whenever her sister's voice took on that honeyed echo, but the reason for just why it did so eluded her. Her hand was perfectly fine, but she knew an accident long ago had seared away part of the back of Coral's left hand, forcing her to replace it with a flexible metal plate of some unknown origin. While her elder sibling usually wore gloves to conceal the implant, such as the riding gloves she had on, it was not an unknown for her to show it off for one reason or another. Pearl had long suspected that the tendency for her own hand to itch and throb gently was a side-effect of some sort of charming influence, but she saw no reason to ever try to discuss it. Besides, Coral really did have some of the greatest ideas whenever inspiration struck her...

"Look, I've got an idea, but it'll need some work first," Coral said in a neutral tone. "However, we have to capture him alive."

"Good luck," Pearl growled, turning her head to spit over the edge of the parapet. "Tell you what, if you get to him before I do, subdue him any way you want. If you can," she added in a warning tone. "If I find him? He's dead."

"Fine," Coral sighed quietly as she reached up to gingerly massage the bridge of her nose. She paused as a new sound reached her ears, a distinctly heavy sound of metal rasping against metal that seemed oddly familiar. "Hey, was that the portcullis being opened?" she asked the open air as she turned her attention back to the cloud of dust.

"What?" Pearl gasped as she whirled around to look west as well.

Coral blinked as she thought she glimpsed motion within the veil of dust, quickly raising the binoculars to let her focus a little more closely. She saw nothing at first and was about to chalk the sound up to the collapsing of the front entrance when a carriage suddenly emerged from the cloud.

"Sis!" Pearl yelped.

"I see it," Coral replied in a low tone as she tried to zoom closer. The edges of her mouth tugged down in a sharp frown as she made out the blonde face of one of her father's slaves holding the reins, a defiant and feisty woman by the name of Celene. Both Coral and Pearl had suspected her of being the leader or at least the driving force behind a series of very subtle acts of rebellion against their father's rule, but so far nothing had been conclusively proven. The situation was made harder by the Baron himself, as he was interested in 'charming' the woman without having to use any of his vampiric powers as a sort of test of his 'prowess' and hence paid very scant attention to his daughters' words of warning about the blonde human.

Well, so much for his experiment, Coral thought to herself as she tracked the motion of the carriage. A series of blurred shadows could be seen in the curtained windows, suggesting that more slaves were riding inside the carriage on what they thought was their way to freedom. "Think they'll be able to make it past the minefield without killing themselves?" she wondered aloud.

"Even if they do," Pearl replied in a chilling tone, "They won't get past me. Think a single salvo will be enough?" she inquired as she leaned her rail-gun against the wall and moved to pick up her crossbow.

Coral paused to watch out of the corner of her eye as Pearl opened up a small box, picking out a pair of bulbous attachments that could be fitted over the tip of a crossbow bolt. "I'd aim for the back axle first, myself," she replied indifferently as she returned her focus to the carriage. "You'd need a second shot for the driver, but I think you'd want to take it anyway. It's Celene holding the reins, by the way."

"Oh?" Pearl said, pausing briefly before carefully screwing the explosive tip into place and loading her crossbow. "You're right. Two will be enough, one for the axle and the second one just for her."

"Tsk tsk," the elder dunpeal murmured to herself. "You're a vindictive one, Pearl, you know that? Wait," she suddenly said in a sharp tone as she saw a second horse emerge from the cloud of dust that continued to billow up from the collapsing castle. She stared at the dark rider intently before it finally sank into her mind. "It's him," she whispered in awe.

"Eh?" the other woman said, still focused on tipping the other bolt with the explosive warhead.

"D," Coral said simply as she lowered her binoculars, still staring at the carriage as it began a cautious turn to the right to remain perfectly centered on the road. "He's following the carriage out. Pearl... hold on for a few, okay? They're coming this way, but they're taking their time in doing so. I think we've got a few moments to think about what to do before they get here."

"Coral?" Pearl said very slowly, her voice clearly filled with unease. "Don't be stupid. D's deadly, we both know that. There's no way we can take him on, even if it's two against one. I say just shoot him now and be done with it. That way we can both get stinking drunk and spend the rest of the night pissing on his corpse without needing to worry ever again about waking up one evening to find the tip of his sword hovering over us and ready to gut us from crotch to gizzard."

"Oh, I don't know," Coral murmured very softly to herself as an odd smile touched her lips, reaching up to lightly brush a fingertip over her exposed nipple. "I wouldn't mind having the tip of his... sword hovering over my crotch..."

Pearl blinked as she caught the sound of her sister's voice but couldn't make out the words. "What was that?" she inquired in an uneasy tone.

The other dunpeal remained silent as she stared at the approaching horse-drawn carriage and the lone rider following behind it. They were making a turn to the left now, and she figured that they had perhaps another thirty seconds to go before they would be on the straight portion of the road and essentially free of the minefield. Her right hand came up to absently tap the back of her left wrist, her fingertips dancing back and forth almost as if she were idly playing a piano as she thought.

"Pearl, we can do this," she suddenly spoke up as she made a decision.

"Do what?" Pearl replied with open wariness.

"Capture D alive. Or at least try to," Coral amended with a shrug before she turned to her sister, reaching out to grab her by the collar so she knew she had her full attention. "Listen carefully," she said in a low tone, her pale yellow eyes taking on a faint gold luminescence. "You focus on dealing with that bitch Celene and the others, D is mine. Do NOT shoot at him unless he gets past me, is that clear?"

"Your funeral, sis," Pearl muttered with a soft snarl.

A knowing smirk crossed Coral's face. "Trust me, little sister," she said in a faint purr, leaning forward to kiss her on the cheek before letting go and turning around to the sensor control panel. "Okay, keep low," she said as she lowered her voice and crouched down. "Soon as the carriage goes through I'll drop the portcullis and trigger the ballast charge, so don't worry if part of the archway collapses."

"Whatever," Pearl replied with a dismissive shrug as she carefully brought her crossbow to bear and crouched low in the sniper niche. She tensed as the sound of galloping hooves reached her sensitive ears, knowing that the carriage was now only seconds away from the archway and the slaves from their freedom.

Not on my watch, the dunpeal promised silently as she carefully exhaled.

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He would have been far more wary of the situation if he hadn't been so preoccupied with his thoughts. The secret entrance to Baron Winters' castle had been right where the decrepit diary had said it would be, hidden inside a particular sarcophagus near the back edge of the crypt. The tunnel leading to the catacombs had been filled with forgotten horrors that he would just as soon forget about himself, though there were less of them now after he had to fight his way past a number of them. And as for what he had found waiting for him in the catacombs themselves...

He frowned lightly as the carriage in front of him suddenly seemed to pick up speed now that the road had straightened out. He fully understood their burning desires to escape the vampire's domain, to be free of him for the rest of their natural lives, but he had also explicitly cautioned their leader not to throw caution to the winds as they made their escape. She had assured him that the road was safe once they got past the archway and that the minefield ended before that, but he was still uneasy with the smoothness of things. He had rescued countless slaves from innumerable vampires before, and the way out afterwards was more often than not just as dangerous as going in...

The archway loomed ahead as they continued forward, a small and fairly low-lying stone construction that was maybe thirty yards wide from end to end. It was more of a ceremonial gateway than a literal one as it straddled the road like a stony barricade, as one didn't need to go very far off the road to go around it should the gate be closed for whatever reason. However, given the fact that the terrain behind them was known by everyone to be heavily mined, it would be a brave soul indeed who dared to leave the safety of the road without a discernible reason.

He wasn't quite sure what it was that made him tense up without warning and slow his borrowed horse's pace, but he soon realized that his instincts had done so for a very good reason. The carriage plunged through the archway at a rapid pace, barely spending more than a second inside it before emerging out the other side. He was only moments away from entering it himself when the air seemed to shout with a sharp report, the unmistakable twang of a crossbow being fired from somewhere.

What happened afterwards almost came too quickly for even his extremely honed combat senses to process. The iron grate of the portcullis started to descend, the dull spikes at the base missing the back end of the carriage by a rather wide margin and causing D to reflexively rear his mount up to stall its forward momentum. Failing to stop the carriage didn't seem to matter as the back window was promptly blown out by the crossbow bolt, letting the projectile sail inside where to D's horror it erupted into a ball of fire that decimated the stolen vehicle.

The sound of the blast, however, couldn't fully drown out the sound of something else exploding almost directly above him. A purely reflexive glance upwards revealed a large slab of stone outlined in a dozen tiny sparks as the mortar was shattered by blasting caps. Freed from its anchorings, the massive overhang promptly plunged downwards before he could react, catching both him and his still-rearing mount out in the open to shatter his senses.

Gotcha, Pearl thought to herself with a truly evil smile as she watched the doors of the carriage blow out in a spectacular fashion, accompanied by a literal wall of blood and gore. She wasn't sure how many slaves had been in there, but she was quite sure that their bid for freedom had just been denied with extreme prejudice. And as for you... she thought as she stood up and quickly reloaded. Yes, you, she added as she saw the blonde picking herself up off the road where the blast had thrown her. She zeroed in on Celene's head before lowering her aim slightly, waiting until she had looked up and exposed the curves of her neck before sending the second explosive-tipped bolt towards the hollow of her throat. Her father hadn't been able to charm his way into being able to sink his fangs into that delicate expanse of flesh, but now she would ensure that Celene's virgin throat would not remain intact for long...

Coral ignored the clanging sound of the portcullis hitting the ground, knowing that dropping it hadn't been anything more than a simple attempt at making sure D wouldn't be able to escape with any ease. What she found she couldn't ignore, however, was the sound of bones snapping and flesh imploding as they became squashed beneath a half-ton of free-falling stone. "Aw, shit," she snarled to herself as she jumped up and promptly leapt over the edge where the stone had been blown off, landing only a few feet away from where it had left a minor crater in the road surface.

She paused for a moment as she heard the crossbow twang a second time, casting a quick glance over her shoulder just in time to witness an explosion of crimson mist that scattered bits of flesh and blood in a wide radius. I'll bet that had to sting, she thought absently before she returned her focus to the way the slab was resting on the ground at an angle. She winced at the way a sheet of blood and viscera had been squirted out from beneath it, suggesting that her attempt at catching D alive had not gone according to plan.

She was about to cuss again when she heard a faint moan coming from under the slab. She darted over to it without thinking and braced herself as best she could before heaving upwards on the slab. The effort required to move it was far from a trivial one, even with her vampiric strength, and she had to use every ounce of power that she could muster to flip it up and over to flop back down on its other side.

"Gross," she muttered to herself in disgust as the damage became exposed. It was clear that the horse had taken the brunt of the impact and that its internals, or what hadn't been liquefied, were now very much external and what was left was probably no thicker than a pancake. And as for the dark hunter who had been riding it...

Another weak moan caused her to blink hard, realizing that he was still alive and seemingly intact. "Holy shit, I don't believe this," she breathed in a bare whisper as she lunged forward to examine him, scarcely able to fathom that he had not only survived being squished by the slab but that he was still hanging on to semi-conscious. "Absolutely incredible..."

"Did you get him?" Pearl called out from atop the archway as she carefully leaned over to survey the results of her sister's plan. She blinked at the carnage and winced, recoiling slightly from the sight of so much raw gore. The blood didn't bother her in the least, but there was just something nauseating about seeing some creature's abdomen compressed to a thickness of maybe two inches and the formerly solid contents splattered around like so much gelatin. "Eww, I think you got him..."

"Guess what?" Coral called back over her shoulder, giving her sister a truly delighted smile. "He's alive."

"Bullshit!" Pearl gasped, blinking hard in disbelief. "Look what it did to his horse, how the hell could he have survived that? His chest has to be flatter than my ass now..."

"I told you to trust me," Coral cooed before turning to look down at D. She blinked hard as he moaned again, his eyelids fluttering slightly as if they were about to open. She paused to think for a moment before sighing and gently shaking her head to herself. "No, I don't think I can risk having you wake up just yet," she murmured as she tugged her left glove off, exposing the metal plate imbedded in her skin. It covered the back half of her hand, extending back to the mid-point of her lower arm and forward over her knuckles to the first joint in each finger. The metal seemed to be unusually pliant, adhering to the curves of her hand like normal skin and able to flex along with her fingers without any resistance or stiffness.

She blinked as D made a soft hissing noise to himself, parting his eyelids just enough to try to see what was going on around him. He seemed to be quite dazed at first, trying to focus on the clouds above him before his eyes tilted just slightly to the right to look at her.

"On the other hand," Coral said softly to D as she flexed her left hand before curling it into a fist, "Sometimes I just love being right. Sorry, D, but this one really is going to hurt me more than it hurts you. See you in the morning," she added in a soft, almost tender whisper before she drew her arm back and belted him as hard as she could in the jaw.

The world was already badly fragmented to begin with, or at least it was to D's damaged perception, and the blow across his jaw only served to shatter it into tinier pieces as his mind was sent spiraling down into the dark depths of unconsciousness. He thought for a moment that he felt a gentle touch on his lips, as if a feather-light kiss was being given, before everything faded out and he finally slipped into a merciful, painless void of empty silence.

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Even though dunpeals were only half-vampire and could rely on their human side to protect them from things that would weaken if not outright kill a noble vampire, they were still sensitive to exposure to the sun. As such, they still retained the preternatural awareness of full vampires in regards to where the sun was and instinctively knew when it crossed the horizon to either rise or set. The tingle produced by each event was unique, and it was the slightly more ominous sensation of the rising sun that finally drew D's mind out of the abyss and back into some semblance of awareness.

Another innate awareness that both vampires and their dunpeal descendants shared was a sensitivity to their depth within the ground. A vampire in need of healing instinctively sought respite in the cool embrace of the earth, as it was both the creator and host of the circle of life that sustained all living creatures. The notion of needing to sleep in coffins was viewed by vampires as being the longest-running joke in the history of life, as all they truly needed was protection from the sun and the occasional immersion in the ground. It was thought by some that a coffin was simply an economical solution to both, as it was quite dark when you were buried underground in one, but very few vampires bothered with coffins except to use them as travelling beds when on an extended journey for one reason or another.

It was this 'earth awareness' that brought him a faint feeling of comfort as he very slowly and painfully clawed his way back up to consciousness, able to tell that he was currently underground. That wasn't to say he was buried in a dirt-filled pit or anything, but that it was unlikely he would have to be overly concerned about immediate exposure to the sun. And if what he thought his body was trying to tell him was anywhere close to being true, he had very little reason to believe he had the strength to survive the searing rays of the sun for longer than a few minutes.

"Sis?" a very faint voice registered on the slowly congealing fragments of his mind. He couldn't even tell if it was a male or female voice, let alone who it might have belonged to or where it was coming from, but he took another small measure of comfort from the fact that he could still hear.

"I'm working on it," another voice replied as a new sensation registered, this one of something brushing against his foot. He would have stopped to try to focus on it if he thought he could spare the energy. Right now his main goal was to try to identify and quantify the searing agony in his chest. It was exquisitely sharp, ebbing and flowing just slightly with every breath he managed to take. He carefully began to dredge the mental sludge that was his memories, trying to remember what had happened to him recently.

"Work faster, I think he's waking up," the first voice prodded in a flat tone. It became clear that the voice belonged to a woman, though there was little else that he could tell by the sound alone.

"Almost done," the second voice promised, also resolving into that of a woman's. A sharp sound registered on his ears at the same time a cold feeling was reported in his leg, followed by the feeling of motion as it was jerked to the left before becoming still again. "There, done," the voice said, seeming to sigh quietly with relief.

The carriage, D suddenly thought as the memories slowly began to return. The fragmented edges of his mind began to assemble themselves as he started to walk himself through the distorted images, slowly clearing them up into focus as his consciousness began to reassert itself.

"So now what?" the first voice prompted.

"Listen carefully," the second voice replied in a low tone, seeming to be tainted with a dangerous edge. "He is mine, and we will do things my way. I will let you play with him all you want, I promise, but here are the ground rules. One, leave his face alone. He's quite handsome and I'd rather not see him marred. Two, same goes for his balls. Hands off and don't break them in any way, understood?"

"What?" the first voice said in open surprise.

"You heard me," the second voice growled. "Just don't do it, okay?"

"Spoilsport," the first voice sulked. "Any others?"

"Just one more, a simple one. Don't kill him."

"But sis...! ERK!"

"Do. Not. Kill. Him. Am I clear?" the second voice said clearly.

"Ow, let go!"

"AM I CLEAR?" she repeated in a glacial tone.

"Alright, damn you, I won't kill him! Ah... damn, Coral, what's with you all of a sudden?" the first voice demanded, rasping just slightly for a moment.

A truly dark chill crept down D's spine as he realized that he had been captured somehow after leaving the Baron's castle. The memories were still a tangled jumble, but he kept seeing a mental image of a carriage racing down the road with him following it.

"He's mine, dear sister, and I'll explain it all to you later. For now, let me deal with him until I'm sure he can handle your skilled touch," was the honeyed reply, the final words seeming to be edged with coy amusement. "Don't look at me like that, I've never broken a promise to you before, now have I? You'll get to play with him soon. Now settle down. Oh, and pass me that, will you? Thank you, Pearl," she purred after a moment.

The carriage, he thought again as he struggled to both remember and cope with the continuing burning in his chest. He was pretty sure that something was either broken or had been recently broken and was still in the process of mending. Unfortunately, there was so much pain that he wasn't sure where it was coming from save that it seemed to be confined to his upper chest. The surging of pain every time he inhaled, even as shallow as possible, was not a good sign either. He didn't think his lungs had been punctured or collapsed by whatever had wounded him, but as long as he could still breathe properly and not suffocate the 'why' was a secondary concern at best.

A sudden cool sensation across his face jolted him into a slightly higher degree of consciousness, briefly drawing his mental focus away from his chest injuries and attempts at remembering what had happened in the recent past. It felt like someone was brushing a damp cloth across his face, an oddly welcome sensation that helped him refocus his sense of direction.

He realized that he was lying face-up on his back, and that whatever he was lying on felt to be padded just slightly. A few simple twitches of his arms and legs resulted in the discovery that he was essentially spread-eagled and that something distinctly cold was around both his wrists and ankles. The overall mental picture was not one he found to be comforting, as he doubted he would be in that position if he were being tended to by any sort of physician.

"D?" a soft voice murmured quietly, seeming to be very close to him. "I know you're awake, or at least you're somewhat conscious now. Can you try to open your eyes for me?"

His mind had recovered enough to the point where he was fairly sure that he wasn't in a good situation, his instincts warning him that he was probably in significant danger. Nevertheless, the soft-spoken request was still rather reasonable given the fact that he would have to have a look at his surroundings sooner or later.

The task was unusually difficult for some reason, his eyelids seeming to weigh far more than normal and felt like they were glued together. He kept at it, however, and soon they yielded to his will to part just enough to assure him that he wouldn't be blinded by further efforts. Visual focus was another matter entirely, as everything was very much a blur to him, but he knew that he had to take things one step at a time.

"There we go," the voice purred softly as there was the sound of something being dipped in water, followed by the cool sensation of something wet brushing against his throat. "I see what they meant by their depths. Very enchanting, if I may say so myself."

D paused to try to decide what to make of her response to his efforts, not certain if it was a good thing or not. Figuring that he had little to lose at the current moment in time, he closed his eyes for a moment to try to gather his strength before forcing them open enough to let him see properly.

It seemed an eternity passed before the gray blurs resolved into distinct blobs of color, slowly reshaping into discrete lines and curves as his eyes adjusted to the low level of light. A small motion off to the side caused him to reflexively focus on it, squinting slightly until the details were finally brought into focus.

She was smiling gently as she gazed back at him. There didn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary at first, a pair of pale yellow eyes framed by a silky mane of soft light gray hair. It wasn't the kind of gray associated with old age, but rather a pale silvery hue that was far richer in tone as it seemed to shimmer faintly with reflected light. Her face was rather young, making her seem to be on the heavy side of twenty but not still not too far removed from her youth. He would have thought little else about her had he not caught a glimpse of the points on her ears, not the sharp prominences of noble vampires but still obvious enough to indicate she had vampiric blood in her veins.

A dark chill swept through him as he realized that she was a dunpeal like he was, which meant that he was in very serious danger right now. The memories suddenly rushed back at him as if a switch had been thrown, remembering how he had been following the carriage out after slaying Baron Winters. The memory of the carriage exploding in front of him chilled his blood even further, but what truly turned his insides into an icy slush was the memory of being caught under the falling overhang as it was blasted off the rest of the archway. How he had retained consciousness after that was nothing short of a miracle, but it had been enough to let him catch a glimpse of his captor and the look in her pale yellow eyes...

Eyes that were now looking at him again, widening slightly as she saw the flicker of recognition that he knew had flashed across his own eyes the instant his memories had returned. He suddenly realized that he had made a very grave mistake in his research earlier about Simon Winters and his descendants. He had made sure to account for all of his vampiric children, born to the noble vampiress Lady Valentina Winters, but he had never found any indication that he had sired any children on humans. Tried to, if what two of the female slaves had whispered about was true as they shivered at the memories of what they had been forced to do, but no other children had been mentioned. And for whatever reason, it simply didn't cross his mind to stop and ask the slaves if they knew of any other relatives of the recently departed Baron...

"I see you're more than a little awake," the voice said, gently drawing him out of his thoughts and refocusing him on his current situation. "I'll be honest, I'm surprised you've recovered this quickly, but then again I'm still amazed that you even survived to begin with. Can you talk, by chance?"

D closed his eyes briefly as he tried to draw in enough breath to at least attempt to speak. The effort was a costly one, sending a searing wave of agony across his chest like a wave cresting over the shoreline. All that emerged from his lips was a muted gasp that might not have been audible had she not been focused so intently on him.

"I guess not," she replied in a disappointed tone as she let her eyes roam across his upper body. "Oh, well, I'm sure you'll find your voice soon enough. How are you... oh, my," she said as she brushed a hand across his chest, only to reflexively draw it back as the contact caused him to hiss sharply. "Yes, I would imagine you'd be a bit sore after all that. Here, let me get a good look, hmm?" she purred in a silken tone as she very carefully unbuttoned his tunic and drew the fabric aside.

"Damn," a distant female voice said softly as the woman hovering over him took a step back, her pale eyebrows arching clear up to her hairline.

"Wow," she breathed quietly as she studied the extensive bruises that left the skin of his chest a mottled pattern of blue, purple, and black. "And to think you had all night to heal that, too. Maybe it did collapse something," she said over her shoulder, casting an uneasy look at someone D couldn't see.

"Told you," the other voice replied simply. "Seriously, seeing what it did to the horse? I know his armor felt pretty solid, but even tempered metal like that can be compressed under that much weight. Even if he didn't break anything, I know every single muscle fiber in his chest got bruised. There's simply no way he could have avoided that sort of damage."

"Still," the pale-haired dunpeal sighed as she turned her attention back to D. She paused and blinked as she saw the level of focus in his eyes, her own narrowing slightly in suspicion. "D?" she murmured. "Now I know you're awake, and I'm willing to bet you've got your marbles sorted out by now, too. Say something, or at least give me an indication you can understand me."

"Wh..." D rasped softly, almost silently as he tried to force his voice to work. The searing agony in his chest made it hard for him to draw in enough breath to make his larynx vibrate but he persisted in the effort until he had enough air to force the sounds to form. "Who... are..."

A gentle smile touched the edges of her soft lips. "That'll work. As to who I am... I'm surprised you even have to ask, D. Hm?" she added as she saw the look in his eyes, sighing quietly as she realized that for whatever reason he truly didn't appear to know. "Oh, now I'm disappointed with you, D, truly. And here I thought I was next on your list. No matter," she added lightly as the smile returned to her face. "I am, or at least now I am, Baroness Coral Winters, daughter of his lordship Baron Simon Winters. You did recently meet with him, I trust?" she said in an almost lilting manner.

D narrowed his eyes slightly, not entirely sure what to make of her rather odd behavior. Most other vampires and dunpeals would be raging at him by now after the death of one of their own at his hands, but she didn't seem to be overly concerned by that little detail. Granted there had been a few who had thanked him for sparing them the task of disposing of their troublesome elders, usually the noble children of a particularly long-lived vampire or vampiress, but something in the back of his mind was warning him that she wasn't one of those proverbial bitter apples.

"C'mon, sis, just get on with it," the voice spoke up in the distance.

Coral sighed quietly and craned her neck to peer over her shoulder. "I said settle down," she said in an openly patient tone before turning back to D and making a casual gesture with her chin. "My younger sister Pearl," she said by way of explanation. "Oh, don't worry, you'll get to know her pretty well soon enough, but one thing at a time. How's your memory holding up?" she asked as she leaned forward slightly to study the hideous bruises on his chest again.

"The carriage," D whispered, trying not to let the pain show in his voice. He very carefully tried to flex his arms and legs as discreetly as possible, attempting to get a feel for the specifics of his situation.

"Ah, yes, the carriage," Coral mused as she glanced down, studying the way his hand twitched gently. "Well, what can I say, D? Sometimes you need to use a firm hand to remind your slaves of their place at times. Okay, so maybe my dear little sister missed the rear axle that I suggested she aim for and hit the window instead. Not that I think it was an accident, as she is quite the hawk-eyed sniper with that crossbow of hers, but mistakes do happen. And as for Celene..." she said before trailing off, shrugging her shoulders in absent dismissal after a few moments of empty silence. "Had my father been smart he would have had his way with her ages ago, as all men do with human slaves they lust after, and then killed her once she became unruly so she couldn't pose a future threat. In any case, I'm not about to even pretend to cry over the loss of a rebellious bitch like her. Oh, I'll admit that her death was... a little over-the-top," she added in a light tone before giving him a predatory smile, "But to each their own style when it comes to executing treasonous slaves."

D said nothing as she returned to studying his chest, trying to keep a firm grip on the roiling of his stomach. There had been seven humans in total he tried to rescue, though one had perished inside the castle when part of the roof collapsed before he could reach her. The remaining six, led by Celene, had led him to the stables in the castle courtyard where they quickly made use of the Baron's carriage and horses in their bid for freedom. It was not the first time such an escape attempt had been thwarted, but it still sickened him to contemplate how callous and uncaring his kind could be when it came to such things. Humans were all but powerless against vampires and their evil ways, and yet they were still routinely cut down in cold-blood on a whim for sport or even casual amusement.

His kind, D thought bitterly as he glanced over at Coral, feeling the dark rage trying to ignite itself yet again. He knew that all the vampires were related by blood to one degree or another, or so the legends went, but he knew that he had absolutely nothing in common with any of them save for the hunger for living blood needed to sustain his darker half. He rarely found anything in common with other dunpeals as well, despite being half-human themselves and thus likely sharing the same capacity for emotion and feelings as he had. No, almost to a man they were just as heartless and soulless as their 'noble' kin, little more than breathing masses of sinister evil given flesh and fang.

"Damn," Coral said quietly in admiration, obviously impressed by the sheer amount of damage done of his chest that he had managed to survive. "They said you were unstoppable, D, and I'm starting to think they meant literally. Let me see what else happened to you," she said as she started to undo the rest of his buttons.

"Hey, sis?" Pearl spoke up suddenly. "I have an idea. If you want to strip him or something, why don't you let me handle that? It'll be a snap," she added languidly, her words accompanied by the sharp sound of what sounded like a whip being gently cracked.

Coral blinked hard and twisted around, giving D a fairly decent view of her body in profile. The dark blouse she wore seemed to have been carelessly closed, three of the five button-holes empty where a fastening would normally be. That left a modest portion of her decollete exposed but not indecently so, revealing a swath of pale and seemingly flawless skin.

"I don't know, Pearl, that might be a little rough on him," she replied in an uneasy tone. "I would imagine that his back isn't in much better shape."

"You said I could play with him," Pearl countered as there was another whip-cracking sound. "Come on, you want to see him suffer just as much as I do after what he did to Father. Just think of this as a warm-up. If he screams too much or can't handle it, I can always stop and you can grab a knife or a pair of scissors to finish the job."

"You do have a point," Coral admitted as she turned to look back at D, her right hand absently rubbing the back of her gloved left hand. "What do you think, D, ready to meet my charming little sister?" she inquired lightly. "She isn't what you would call experienced with men, but I'm sure you'll be able to cope with her attentions. Here, up you go," she added as she stepped back and tugged on a lever behind his field of vision.

D blinked hard as the entire surface he was lying on began to tilt at an angle, slowly rotating forward ninety degrees until he was essentially standing on a small shelf. With his new perspective, he immediately noticed that he was in a dungeon of some sort, and that his wrists and ankles were bound to the edges of the padded frame by metal chains.

A searing pain immediately erupted from both his chest and his ankles, suggesting that the heavy armored plates in his boots hadn't been able to fully protect them from being crushed by the falling rock. He didn't think that they had been broken or shattered at any point, but there was enough pain to suggest that it was doubtful he would be able to walk on his own within the immediate future. As it was, it was hard enough with his weight on them without having to scream or otherwise make a sound to indicate he was in significant pain.

He cast a brief glance over his shoulder as best he could when a heavy clicking sound reached his ears, able to watch with his peripheral vision as the padded surface he had been lying on was split in half and folded back to rest against the sides of the frame. That left his back open and exposed, as he was essentially left chained between two large metal columns.

The sensation of something cold pressing just below his chin enticed him to turn his head back around, finding himself almost nose-to-nose with a rather beautiful young woman with aqua-blue eyes. As with Coral, it took him an extra moment to realize that she too was a dunpeal, the hallmark points on her ears all but masked by the short shock of extremely fine and pale blue hair. The coloring was so pale as to almost appear white if seen under a strong glare, though not easily mistaken for the white hue of a woman many decades her elder.

Pearl pressed slightly harder on the handle of her whip, forcing D's head to tilt back slightly so she could gaze into his eyes. "Yeah, I see what you mean about his eyes," she finally said in a neutral tone. "I'm not sure I'd go so far as to call them enchanting, but they do have a depth to them you don't find in many others. So you're the legendary vampire hunter, hmm?"

D remained silent as he gazed back at her, trying to get a feel for what she was like. While Coral was somewhat hard to read, if only because he had yet to decide what to make of her rather erratic behavior, it was quite clear to him that Pearl openly hated him. The spark of anger in her eyes appeared to be kept in careful check at the moment, but he had encountered that very same spark in the eyes of countless others and knew that her rage could be unleashed on him in an instant. Whether her current level of control stemmed from her own will or was a result of Coral's influence was unknown, but he knew that he would have to find out fairly quickly if he was going to have even the faintest of hopes of making it out of his situation alive.

Not that his prospects appeared hopeful. The explorative tuggings he had attempted earlier warned him that the metal bonds had been fastened with almost no wiggle room whatsoever. Even if he had not been bound, his strength had been all but obliterated by the falling rock and the subsequent concentration of what little energy he had left to focus on healing himself. Then there was the fact that the odds were two-to-one against him. While that was nothing to be concerned about under normal circumstances, he was both unarmed and without his protective armor at the moment while they were clearly prepared to deal with him should he even look like he was going to try something. He had been in quite a number of hairy situations before where the initial odds of survival were not encouraging, but this was the first time he could remember being in a situation that seemed to be truly hopeless.

"Not a talkative one, I see," Pearl observed calmly as she tapped the butt of her whip against his chin before taking a step back and reaching for the front of her shirt. The outfit she wore was not too different from Coral's, consisting of a dark-colored blouse and contour-hugging pantaloons. As he watched, the blouse was quickly unbuttoned and drawn off to reveal a sleeveless black undershirt that left her well-muscled arms bare. The shirt was more than a little tight in the front, outlining both the moderate swells of her petite breasts and the subtle points of her nipples.

"Showing off again, Pearl?" Coral mused lightly as she took a few steps back to observe from a distance.

Pearl cast a sidelong glance at her older sister as she cast the blouse aside and started rolling her shoulders. "It's called freedom of movement, sis," she replied in a faintly edged tone. "Hard to wield a whip properly if you don't have enough room to move your arms. And after that stunt you pulled last night with your shirt open like that, I don't think you've got much room to talk about showing off."

"Yes, well," Coral sighed as she glanced down at the front of her blouse, one hand coming up to absently tug on a loose thread where a button had once been, "Like I said, it was the first thing that came to mind when I realized I might have looked like D from a distance. It worked, though," she added as she glanced up to give her sister a meaningful look.

Pearl just rolled her eyes at the ceiling. "Be glad I'm your sister and not someone who would either be sexually aroused or traumatized by the sight," she muttered before grabbing the tip of the whip in her left hand and snapping small segments of the material to test it for tensile strength. Her gaze fell back down to D's chest, causing her to pause for a moment before reaching out to firmly press a fingertip against his chest where his sternum was.

To D, it was like being struck by a bolt of lightning. Sparks flooded his vision as the pain coursed through his entire body and he was unable to keep himself from gasping aloud between clenched teeth. The world took on a blue cast a moment later as his vampiric side began to thrash against the power of his will that normally kept it dormant, his canine teeth elongating into the prominent points of a vampire ready to use them.

"Pearl..." Coral said in a tone that was laced with a subtle warning.

"Just checking, sis," Pearl replied in an unconcerned tone as she removed her finger and studied him carefully. "Okay, so maybe I'll have to start with his back after all. No big deal, he won't be able to tell the difference soon enough..." she said as she walked around to stand behind him.

Coral tilted her head slightly for several seconds before blinking hard. "Oh, Pearl, wait just another few moments, okay? Silly me, all this excitement going on and I haven't even told D anything about our little playground," she said, chuckling quietly to herself as she moved forward to stand in front of him. She reached out to touch his chin, tilting his head up slightly to look at him for a few moments before making a gesture to the chains that bound him.

"Take a good look at those chains, D," she purred softly. "Know what they are? Adamantium links encased in pure, tempered titanium. It took quite some time to gather enough adamantium for something like this, but Father was kind enough to acquire it for us as a sort of gift. We had to have it reworked on our own, of course," she added, "But you would be amazed at how simple that was once we found the right humans with the right metalworking skills."

D felt an icy chill slide down his spine as he cast a wary glance up at his wrist. Even when in perfect health and with his full strength it would have been quite difficult for him to break or otherwise bend something crafted from tempered titanium. But if what she said about the links having adamantium cores were true, however, then breaking them was well beyond him. He knew very little about the exact metallurgical nature of the extremely rare ore, but he had heard from a few blacksmiths who had worked with it how it was extremely difficult to temper but was virtually unbreakable once crafted into a shape.

"Look around you, D," Coral purred quietly, her thumb coming up to lightly stroke his chin. "It took Pearl and I years to make this place, even with the help of a few dedicated slaves. It was more for Pearl's enjoyment than mine, but we both have found enough entertainment in it to make it all worthwhile. The rack you're tied to? Adamantium and titanium, just like the chains. I'm not sure how strong you really are, as we both know certain stories become... embellished over time, but I don't think even you can break free from them."

He scowled slightly as she leaned closer to him, letting her lips brush against the edge of his ear as she continued to speak very softly. "Do us both a favor and don't try to break them, either," she breathed. "I really, really would rather not have to kill you if you managed to ruin them. Now be a good boy and go play with Pearl. You and I can play later," she added, her voice almost fading away to inaudibility as she very lightly kissed his ear. She then stood up and took several steps back, crossing her arms over her chest and nodding her head at Pearl.

"He's all yours, Pearl," she said calmly. "Remember, don't hurt him where I told you not to hurt him, and don't kill him. That would really spoil the fun," she added with a disturbing smile.

"Alright," Pearl replied as she uncoiled her whip and took a measured step back, trying to gauge the distance between her and the bound dunpeal. She took a second step back as she decided it was better to play it safe and hefted the shaft of her whip carefully. "Hey," she suddenly said, seeming to pause for a moment. "How far can I go with this?"

"Hmm?" Coral said absently, keeping her focus on D. D glanced back at her briefly before focusing on the wall in front of him, blinking in surprise as he saw his sword resting on a small shelf. Everything else of his was likewise spread out across the shelf, his hat and cape neatly folded at one end while his boots and armor were stacked at the other. Between them were his belt and chest bandolier, both still laden with pouches and various devices that he had found uses for at assorted times in his vampire-hunting career. There was far too much space for him to reach across while he was still bound in chains, but the mere knowledge that it was relatively close at hand was enough to ignite the faintest of sparks of hope in his hybrid heart.

"How much do you want taken off?" Pearl inquired carefully as she studied the broad expanse of D's back with a critical eye.

"Let him keep his skin, by all means," the yellow-eyed woman replied as she started to purr very quietly to herself. "But you can take everything else off if you want. Easy on his ass, though. There's nothing wrong with a solid spanking, but you really don't want to whip the shit out of him in a literal sense, now do you?"

Pearl blinked before casting a disturbed look at her sister. "Thanks for the visual, sis," she grumbled before flicking the whip behind her and taking a deep breath. She exhaled slowly as she focused her senses, zeroing in on the spot right between D's shoulder blades. She waited until her lungs were almost empty of air and her body was perfectly steady before bringing her arm forward in a sharp movement.

D's hearing was extremely acute, a skill he continually honed whenever he could as it helped him detect vampires who tended to move in almost perfect silence whenever hunting something. Thus it was all but impossible for him to miss the way the air seemed to hiss just slightly as the whip sliced through it before the pliant tip was jerked to a sudden halt to produce the trademark cracking sound. It was like a thunderclap when compared to the relatively soft hissing of the air an instant ago, and the sudden tensing of his body in the anticipation of feeling the blow only made his nerves that much more sensitive. The expected lash across his back never fell, however, instead feeling a puff of air tease his shirt as the tip of the whip fell short by maybe an inch.

Coral's eyebrows promptly arched up as she noticed that D didn't seem to have reacted in the slightest. The cracking had sounded somewhat odd to her equally sensitive ears as well, prompting her to lean slightly to the side as if she were trying to examine his back. "Pearl?" she called out in a curious tone, wondering if she was missing something.

The pale blue-haired woman simply shrugged in casual dismissal. "Relax, that was just a ranging shot," she assured the other woman. "C'mon, sis, you know I don't miss in a setting like this. Which is more than can be said for your skill with a whip..."

"Just get on with it," Coral grumbled, her face twisting into a sullen pout for a few seconds before smoothing out as she looked over at D again. "Siblings," she muttered soft enough for only D to hear. "You try to learn how to do things their way and never hear the end of it when you happen make a few mistakes after having borrowed their favorite slave for target practice."

It took D a moderate amount of effort not to openly snarl at her casually callous attitude. It was people like her that had started him on his darkened path in life, witnessing the constant pain and suffering of innocent humans at the uncaring and sometimes openly sadistic hands of vampires. Some he had made a vow to destroy regardless, those who had taken part in the assault on his father's palace that triggered the global catastrophe known as the Blood Wars, but far too many others had failed to show the slightest regard for the value of human lives, innocent beings whose sole crime was living under the yoke of vampiric evil.

You should know better, D had sometimes been tempted to shout out to the other dunpeals he had encountered who were just as evil and merciless as their noble ancestors. You who have a human parent and human feelings, you should know this is wrong, you should know that human lives are equally as important and precious as our own! But that urge to confront them and try to open their eyes had long ago faded, trodden down by encounter after encounter with such evil creatures that eventually extinguished any lingering hopes of redemption. He then vowed to destroy them all, both vampires and dunpeals alike, so that the humans and their world could be free from the ten-thousand year reign of terror caused by the continued existence of that evil hunger for blood. He knew that he himself would have to follow them into the maw of oblivion as well for the world to be truly free of his blood, but it was a price he was willing to pay for the greater good.

The hissing of the air suddenly snapped him out of his darkened thoughts, catching him off-guard. He didn't have time to quietly curse himself for his lapse in attention before his back jerked beneath the onslaught of pain. The gesture had been little more than a reflex as the stinging sensation wasn't all that great, the very tip of the whip grazing his flesh as it rent the fabric of his shirt. There was a sudden silence that lasted for maybe four beats of his quickened pulse before the air hissed again and another exquisitely fine needle of pain was felt in his upper back.

"Whoops," Pearl said casually, causing Coral to blink.

"Whoops?" the other woman echoed, giving her an uneasy look.

"I just realized what his shirt is made of," Pearl replied with a faint gesture of her free hand. "It's that expensive stuff from the northeast, the really soft but sturdy kind. I'll bet it cost him a pretty coin or three, but I'll also bet it was probably worth it and then some. Oh, well," she added with an empty sigh before slowly refocusing and drawing the whip back.

"Oh, that stuff," Coral commented as she nodded, pausing as D was whipped again. "I had a nightgown made from that once. You weren't kidding about the price, but it lasted for quite a number of years. Smooth, too. Not like silk or satin, mind you, but it..." She paused as another sharp crack was heard, this one causing the corners of D's mouth to visibly twitch. "It served its purpose fairly well. What just happened?"

"He moved," Pearl explained in a casual manner, as if they were talking about the weather. She drew her whip back and lashed out again, unable to keep herself from smiling as D twitched again at the contact. "I'm doing the best I can, of course, but the difference between hitting his shirt and hitting him is pretty miniscule. As long as he holds still, however, there won't be any sort of problems to worry about. So how'm I doing, D?" she called out in a light tone as she lashed out again, this time deliberately letting the tip edge forward a fraction of an inch farther than she needed.

Unlike the previous strikes, which has been quite sharp but confined to discrete points on his back, the latest blow etched a burning line of fire just under his left shoulder blade. The jolt of pain forced him to almost literally bite his lower lip to keep himself from making any kind of noise, not wanting to give her the satisfaction of making him cry out. He had the very bothersome feeling that if the experience were to last for too much longer, his willpower wouldn't be able to fully withstand the constant jolts of pain. He was still suffering heavily to begin with, given the still-searing feeling in his chest and the fiercely protesting nerves in his ankles, and he knew that even he had his limits.

"D?" Coral spoke up, seeming to be faintly amused by something. "Silence is golden and all that, but you really should speak when someone else asks you a question. It's rude not to, you know," she added. "Especially when she's holding a whip..."

"I'm not worried about it," Pearl said as she lashed out yet again, this time barely grazing his skin as she continued to methodically cut a horizontal line across the back of his tunic. "He'll be singing soon enough. Now there's a thought for you," she said as she paused for a moment before drawing the whip back behind her. "Think he's the kind to sing in the shower?"

"Ooooh," Coral purred softly to herself, casting a brief glance over at D as he reflexively twitched beneath the precision blow. "Don't say things like that, it gives me the really soft shivers just thinking about it. Let's get him housebroken first before we can wonder about such things, okay?"

"Whatever, sis," Pearl sighed as she flicked the whip across his back at a slight angle, leaving another small tear in his shirt. She paused to study the new rent for a moment before curling the edges of her lips down in a small frown. "You know this is going to take awhile, right?" she grumbled.

"You wanted to do it that way," Coral reminded her.

Pearl wrinkled her nose before pausing to deliver another carefully aimed blow to D's upper back, inflicting an identical tear parallel to the first. "Yeah, but not too gently. Hey, do me a favor and take a peek at his back for me and let me know what kind of condition his skin is in. I don't want to move now that I've got the distance ironed out," she explained.

"Alright," Coral purred quietly, casting a somewhat sultry glance at D as she approached. She paused to lightly brush her fingertips over his arm before reaching around him, slipping a finger into the surprisingly straight and even tear in the back of his shirt to pull it open. "Oooh, now look at this," she cooed as she pulled her finger down, letting Pearl see the patch of skin for herself.

"Great," Pearl replied with a wicked smile, delighted to see that his back was virtually undamaged. She would have to change that, of course, but now she knew she didn't need to hold back nearly as much. "Step back, I think it's time to pick up the pace a little bit."

"Mmmm," the gray-haired woman hummed softly to herself as she glanced over at D, studying the look of controlled pain in his eyes. "You will, I trust, let me know if my darling little sister is being too rough with you?" she said in a low, almost husky tone as she briefly ran her hand along his arm. "We don't want her to wind up with the wrong kind of reputation, now do we, D?"

D remained silent as he glanced back at her before refocusing his gaze on his sword. He knew that it was likely he was going to be tortured for quite some time and that he needed to conserve as much of his strength as possible. He had been injured countless times before, sometimes almost winding up on the doorstep of death itself, but never before had any sort of captivity been like this. Brutally beaten until he was senseless, yes, and another time having a spike driven into his chest that missed his heart by what had to be a fraction of an inch, but never had he been deliberately toyed with like this. They had all known it would have been too dangerous to do so, as every moment he was conscious was another moment he had to possibly escape and come back to exact his own brand of vengeance on them. So why were these two sisters taking that risk by torturing him like this?

His moment of reflection was abruptly ended by the hissing of the whip, only instead of feeling another needlepoint of pain he found himself having to cope with a jagged line of fire that spanned the full length of his back. The burning sensation was intense, almost as if a knife had been drawn across the skin at a moderate depth. Oddly enough, he could tell from the throbbing that followed that his skin hadn't been broken by the blow and would likely only bruise and swell up.

"Easy, Pearl," Coral cautioned as she watched D jerk against the chains, his back arching as his muscles spasmed from the fiery pain.

An exasperated sigh rose up from the other woman. "Do you want to try to do this?" she challenged in a level tone. "Just grab a chair and sit down to watch the show or something. He'll still have his skin on when I'm done, so relax."

Coral said nothing as she watched her sister wind up again to deliver a second blow to D's back, the sound of several inches of the whip's surface slapping across both fabric and skin making her twitch slightly. She often found it quite the experience to watch Pearl ply her skill with the whip, the application made with such exquisite precision and care that could easily be elevated to an art form. The results could also be viewed as works of art, a fully-dressed human being stripped of clothing one shred at a time with very few marks left on the skin to indicate how her skin has been so deliciously bared before their eyes.

The strokes that she observed being delivered, however, were far cries from Pearl's usual delicate touch. D's body rocked with each blow that landed, leaving behind long tears in his tunic and spasms of pain on the hunter's face. She was sure that Pearl would keep her word and that the flesh of his back wouldn't be split open like a ripe melon, but there was just something about the look in her eye and the way she was gripping the whip that said she wasn't in a mood to be gentle.

She edged herself to the side after a few minutes of watching the tip of the whip lash out again and again, trying to see what it was doing to him. It was obvious that her sister knew what she was doing, as the upper part of his shirt was almost completely shredded now as if a giant cat had came by to use him as a scratching post. The blows were being directed lower now, close to the base of his spine as he continued to be methodically stripped in a most painful fashion.

The silence in the room became almost eerie as time went on, broken only by the rhythmic cracking of the whip and the creaking of the metal chains as D continued to rock with each blow. Pearl seemed to be completely focused now, her eyes half-closed and barely seeming to breathe as she directed the whip in a calculated fashion. D remained silent as well, much to her surprise. She knew that a human would have screamed himself hoarse by now, but the dunpeal somehow managed to remain stoic save for a ragged rasp in his breathing.

Coral cast a glance to her side as she sensed motion in the distance, one eyebrow arching up as she saw the door open silently. A young girl poked her head into the room, her crisp blue eyes widening dangerously as she realized what was going on. Her gaze fell on Coral as the baroness made a curt gesture, indicating that she should find something else to do. Her slave nodded to her in understanding before she promptly vanished from sight, the door being eased shut a moment later to close with only the faintest of metallic rattles.

The sound, faint as it had been, was enough to cause Pearl to pause in mid-motion, cocking her head sharply towards the doorway. "Hm?" she hummed in a low tone.

Coral sighed softly and made a gesture of dismissal. "It was just Abby," she explained.

Pearl snorted to herself before she flexed her arm gingerly. "I told you she needed to be locked up," she growled, mostly to herself before hefting the whip once again to deliver an unusually vicious blow to the seat of D's pants.

"Hey, hey, hey, easy there," Coral protested calmly. "And leave Abelyne alone, okay? She's a good girl."

"Pah," Pearl countered as she delivered a second, less-powerful blow to D's bottom to create a perfect X-mark. "That's what Father said about Celene, remember?"

"Father was blinded by lust," Coral pointed out, raising an eyebrow as her sister changed the focus of her attacks up to D's left shoulder. "Now what are you doing?" she prodded carefully.

"Forgot the sleeves," Pearl replied as she began to lightly flick the tip of her whip up and down the length of D's arms, turning what was remained of his left sleeve into so many thin and ragged strips of fabric. "And tell me you don't have your own lusts for your slaves like that."

"Oh, here we go again," Coral muttered as she sighed softly.

"Remind me was she doing to you last month when I tripped over you two out on the west tower?" Pearl said in a pointed tone as she finished whipping the fabric off of D's left arm and started in on his right arm. The blows left a trail of torn fabric down to his elbow before they paused, Pearl turning her head to give her sister a piercing look. "Well?" she prompted flatly.

"Like I said," Coral said as she looked away to study a set of rusted manacles hanging from chains set into the mortar in the wall, "She's a good girl who knows how to serve her mistress. If she wishes to please me further after sharing her blood with me, why should I deny her such desires?"

Pearl just rolled her eyes before resuming her efforts. "That's what men are for, sis," she muttered. She continued to flay the remaining fabric off of D's arm before a sudden thought popped into her mind, causing her to freeze in mid-motion. "Sis, about what you said about not ripping his balls off..."

"Don't worry about it, Pearl, I said I would explain things later," Coral replied in a honeyed tone, drawing a glare from her younger sister. "We both know men are delicate creatures when you finally pin them down, and they tend to treasure their manhoods very much. So much so that I wouldn't be surprised if they simply died with their removal. Be that as it may I'm not about to risk it in this case, so for the moment you will steer clear of injuring him in that location. Understood?" she added, her voice turning from charming and honeyed to tempered steel in the span of a single heartbeat.

Pearl simply rolled her eyes again. "Sure, sis, whatever you say," she replied absently as she flexed her wrist several times before hefting the whip once again. She paused for a moment to gauge how much she had left to do and how much space was around her. "Coral, do me a favor and step back a bit. I want to try something new."

"Oh?" Coral inquired in a faintly uncertain tone as she edged back several measured paces. "Like what?"

"Show you in a sec," Pearl promised as she took a single step backwards as well and began to breathe deeply. She closed her eyes briefly while she turned her focus inwards before raising the whip once more, starting to sway it back and forth until the tip rasped against the stone floor in a rhythmic pattern. She then seemed to pause for an instant, taking a deep breath that expanded her chest in a truly inviting fashion before suddenly exploding into motion.

Coral gasped and took a step back as the whip started to lash out faster than she could track, striking the side of D's leg before the tip was whirled around to snap at his other leg like a vicious and hungry cobra. The strikes were as incredible as they were brutal, slapping along not just the fabric of his pants and the flesh beneath but also striking the metal support columns hard enough to make them resonate like tuning forks.

The scent of blood filled the air a few moments later as Pearl continued her frenzied onslaught, her expression twisted into one of bestial fury as she continued to lash out as rapidly as she could. Tiny flecks of crimson began to spackle the floor around D as his trousers all but disintegrated beneath the powerful blows, exposing badly-abused flesh and abraded muscle that began to ooze tiny rivulets of blood.

"Pearl!" Coral snapped as her sister seemed to slip deeper into the sudden burst of rage, her aqua-blue eyes clouded by glowing red corneas and her fangs bared as she gritted her teeth. The muscles of her arm were visibly taut from the frenzied exertions, making Coral wonder if something wasn't starting to kink by now and that Pearl was using the pain to spur her own anger on in a dangerous vicious circle. "PEARL!" she called out again, actively debating her chances of being able to intervene without getting herself hurt by the still-flailing whip or the fury that was driving it.

Pearl spun on the ball of her foot in a full circle before lashing out one final time, the tip of the whip swinging out in a wide arc and coming close enough to Coral to make her leap back with a startled hiss. The whip came back around to catch D in the side at the very top edge of where his pants met his hip, sending a lengthwise split through not just the trousers and the underwear beneath it but also leaving a gash in his side that immediately began to bleed at a slow but steady rate.

The impact threw D against the other support column hard enough to bruise his shoulder and essentially knock the wind out of him. A harsh noise rose up from his throat at the contact, not quite a cry of pain but still nothing that he could have hoped to suppress. An almost inhuman veil of silence arose once the chains quit creaking, broken only by Pearl's heavy panting and the soft but still audible rattling of D's breath trying to re-enter his lungs.

"Damn you, hunter," Pearl snarled very softly as she started to raise the whip again, only to jerk to a halt as Coral's hand grabbed her wrist in a grip that sent sparks of pain shooting throughout her arm.

"Pearl," Coral said in a dangerously calm voice, her pale yellow eyes all but masked by the golden glow of her corneas. Her vampiric fangs, described as tiny when compared to her sister or another vampire but still just as sharp, were barely visible as they peeked out from the edges of her lips. "What do you think you are doing?"

It took the other woman a moment to get her breathing under control to the point of allowing her to talk properly. "I want to hear him scream," she said in a deathly cold voice, her lips barely moving. "He killed our father, and I want to hear him suffer before he dies."

"I'm not going to say this again," Coral countered, increasing the power of her grip until Pearl's lip curled back in constrained pain. "Do not kill him. I need him alive for now."

"For what?" Pearl demanded, her voice dropping to barely a whisper.

Coral stared at her younger sister in silence, her eyes narrowing down to mere slits before she abruptly let go of Pearl's wrist. "I already told you I would explain it later," she said, her voice audibly straining to remain calm and seemingly collected. "In any case, I captured him and so he is mine to do with as I please. I don't mind if you have your fun with him, but you will do so by my rules. You've never been a problem-child, Pearl, and I don't think you really want to start being one now," she added, her voice smoothing out and changing pitch to take on a honeyed aspect.

Pearl snarled quietly to herself as she rubbed her aching wrist, feeling her pulse throbbing in the bruised veins where Coral had gripped her. Her arm was aching fiercely now as well, obviously a result of her sudden slippage into rage at the desire to hear D scream. His silence in the beginning was quite expected, being as strong and resilient as he was, but his continued silence after being exposed to pain that should have had even the most hardened of men crying out in pain and possibly even begging for mercy gnawed at her. She felt she was owed his pain after killing her father, and while nothing she could do to him could ever bring her father back, there was still something to be said for the satisfaction of revenge...

"Pearl," Coral said quietly, seeming to give her a gentle look.

"What?" Pearl growled, still massaging her left wrist.

"It's late," Coral replied softly, reaching up to lightly brush her hand over Pearl's bare shoulder. "The sun rose an hour ago, and we're both still keyed up from what happened earlier. You should think about going to bed soon. Don't worry, D will still be here for you to play with once the sun sets," she cooed with a tender smile. "I promise. Besides, it'll give both you and him time to rest up. The whip-marks should have healed by then, don't you think?"

Pearl's eyes narrowed even more, unable to shake the feeling that she was somehow being manipulated. Her sister had a point about bed, however, as they both had been up since sunrise the previous day. Besides, D wasn't going to be going anywhere, not while he was bound by those literally unbreakable chains. But she still wanted to have some measure of satisfaction first...

"I still want to hear him scream," she finally said in a low tone, all but daring her sister to try to mollify her. "He can still bleed for me. Just let me use a dagger on a non-vital area, I want to hear how he sings..."

"Pearl..." Coral sighed quietly as she briefly ran her fingertips through her flowing gray hair. She paused to stare into her sister's eyes in silence before sighing very quietly again. "Alright," she said in a subdued, almost sullen tone. "One strike in a non-vital area. And I don't care if he screams or not, one strike and that's it. And Pearl?" she added before she reached up to light cup her chin in a gesture that was partly a squeeze and partly a soft caress. "If he dies..."

"Trust me, sis," the other woman assured her calmly as she jerked her chin free from Coral's grasp and crossed the room. The whip was casually flicked to wind up in a neat coil in her hand, hanging it from a small hook on her belt. She went over to the shelf where D's equipment was and studied it for a moment before removing one of the daggers from his belt. She made a soft noise of appreciation as it slid free from the holder with a quiet rasp, revealing an intricate design on the blade that raised her eyebrow in curiosity.

"Hey, sis? Come look at this for a moment," she said as she turned around and held up the blade, blinking as she realized that Coral hadn't moved and still had her back turned to both her and D.

"I'll... take a look for myself in a moment," Coral said quietly without turning around.

Pearl frowned lightly before glancing down at the flower-like engravings on the dagger before shrugging in dismissal. "Yeah, whatever, sis," she said as she advanced towards D, absently hefting the blade in her hand to test it for balance. She stopped directly in front of him, pausing to glance down at the tattered remains of fabric that still clung to him. There might have been enough left of his shirt to make a decent handkerchief if you gathered it up and sewed it together to make a square, though it probably would have been more stitches and thread than actual fabric. His pants were likewise shredded into near-uselessness, though a rather large expanse still remained intact around his groin where she hadn't dared to try to use the whip. The elastic was quite broken on the one side and the rest split into utter ruin, however, which made her wonder what was keeping that last handful in place to preserve his modesty.

She took her time in examining the rest of his body, part of her wincing on the inside at the way his entire chest was still a solid wall of black and bluish-purple bruises. The size and composition of his muscles were obvious now that his skin was exposed, and it was pretty much what she expected to find given his legendary kind of strength. A voice in the back of her mind was whispering an urgent warning that she couldn't afford to let him to regain any of that strength back lest he pose an immediate danger to her. Even now, with his body half-broken and chained down by a metal amalgam that was every bit as legendary as he was, she sensed that he was still a very serious threat.

She reached out to grab his jaw, forcing his head up so that she could see into the dark depths of his eyes. Her own eyes narrowed slightly at what she saw reflected back at her. Pain, certainly, but he was still quite lucid and seemingly in control of himself. His pupils seemed to flicker slightly as he focused on her, the rasp in his throat smoothing out as he visibly tried to rally his strength. If he knew what she intended to do, which she was pretty sure he did, he was doing a damn good job of not letting any sort of emotion show or otherwise giving her any indication that he was overly concerned.

"I'll be honest, D," Pearl said very quietly, unable to keep a slight hint of admiration out of her voice, "You are, without a doubt, the toughest nut I have ever tried to crack. But even the toughest of nuts will break when the right hammer is applied. You killed my father, and for that you will suffer like no living being has ever suffered before. That I promise you, D. When I am finished with you, you will beg me with tears of blood to let your life slip from my fingers and into the cold embrace of death. But for now?" she purred softly as she swung her arm back, "I just want to hear you scream."

Coral closed her eyes as she heard the subtle rustle of Pearl's undershirt moving with her arm, followed by the sound of a dagger being sunk into flesh. A truly sharp gasped echoed throughout the dungeon, the hissing sound of one who suddenly found himself in an incredible amount of pain but yet was using every fiber of his being to suppress it, to keep himself from crying out. It wasn't something she wished to contemplate or visualize, but she knew that it was necessary for her to allow if she wished to keep her sister under control.

Pearl blinked in surprise and amazement, first glancing down to see the full length of the blade imbedded in D's abdomen, then looking back up to see the look in D's eyes. She could almost watch the pain impulses travelling over his optic nerves, surging with each beating of his heart that jostled his lower organs just enough to sear the nerves with unspeakable pain... and yet there still burned a spark of determination, a fierce gathering of his willpower to fight against the mortal agony and not make a sound. The sound of his teeth grinding together and the rasping of his labored breathing were well beyond his level of control, but he still refused to cry out in pain even as the dagger continued to throb slightly in her grip.

"You have to be shitting me," Pearl said quietly in a tone of disbelief, more than a little unnerved by his resolve even as his lifeblood began to seep across the hilt to coat her fingertips. A very soft sound could be heard a few moments later as his blood began to drip off the end of the hilt to form a tiny puddle of crimson. "Just who the living fuck are you, hunter?" she breathed.

"Pearl?" the subdued voice drifted from several feet away, sounding to be unusually tired for some reason. "You forgot to say the magic word."

Pearl blinked at her sister's tone before glancing back to D, trying to figure out what she was talking about before it finally hit her. "Oh, I get it now," she purred in an evil tone. "You know, sis, you're absolutely right, I forgot all about that. Scream for me, D," she said as she readjusted her grip on the dagger and braced. "Please," she added with a truly malicious smile as she twisted the blade as hard as she could.

Coral flinched as the unholy sound filled the room, obviously a result of D's body finally having been taken past its limits of tolerance for pain. The scream was one that was likely to leave his throat raw if not a bloody ruin, a sudden outpouring of every molecule of air in his lungs. She wasn't sure how long the scream went on, the sound seeming to last for an eternity without any sort of interruption before finally falling silent. For a moment she feared that the life had been driven from his body by the experience, but then she heard just the faintest of sounds from over her shoulder, not quite a rasp of breath being drawn but not quite a sob either. Regardless of what it was, it was enough to assure her that he was still alive.

"Thank you, D," Pearl said calmly, a truly dark smile still visible on her lips as she savored her victory. "I guess there's something to be said for manners after all." She glanced down at her hands and very carefully let go of the dagger, leaving it fully imbedded in his abdomen. Satisfied that it would stay put for the moment, she carefully examined the blood that coated her hand before tentatively bringing her fingertips to her lips.

"You don't want to do that," Coral said quietly, her back still turned to both D and Pearl.

Pearl froze in mid-motion, the tip of her tongue barely an inch away from the crimson nectar. "Why not?" she inquired warily as she slowly lowered her hand and tried to figure out why her sister looked so tense all of a sudden.

"You remember what Father said about blood-marriages and how they were performed, right?" Coral said, her voice sounding weary. "That and you don't know how strong his blood is. It could end up dominating you."

Pearl glanced over to where D lay half-slumped, unable to move very far because of the chains around his wrists. "Yeah, alright," she found herself saying after a moment, realizing that her sister probably was not making idle commentary about the potential strength of D's blood. "Well, in any case, I got what I wanted. At least for today," she added in a faintly ominous tone as she glared at D.

"I'll see you tonight then, Pearl," Coral said, almost too softly for her sister's vampiric hearing to detect. "Sleep well."

Pearl paused to try to make sense of her sister's mood. Granted that was not an easy task given Coral's whimsical nature and tendency for sudden shifts in mood, but at least those usually had some reason or method behind them that triggered the change. But as for why she seemed to be so withdrawn all of a sudden was beyond her imagination. "You too, sis," she replied in a slightly uneasy tone. "Try not to have too much fun with him, okay?"

Coral remained silent as she listened to the soft footsteps making their way across the floor. The door creaked slightly as it was first opened, then closed just as gently to leave her alone in the dungeon with D. She finally opened her eyes and sighed very softly, trying not to imagine just how much damage Pearl had done to D and how long it would take for him to regain his strength. Or at least enough of it for her purposes...

Her footsteps where whisper-quiet as she turned around and moved over to stand in front of him, her lips tugging down sharply in a scowl as she saw that the dagger had been left in his abdomen. A small pool of blood had already formed on the metal plate beneath him, continuing to be fed one drop at a time.

"Damn her," she murmured as she reached out to grasp the hilt. She paused as the gesture caused D to inhale sharply, his lips once again pulling back to bare his vampiric fangs. Taking a deep breath to steel herself, she braced her hand against his chest and yanked the blade out of his abdomen.

The moan that followed was enough to make her skin crawl, sounding as if he had wanted to scream again but simply didn't have the strength to do even that much. That was not a good sign in her view, as it suggested that he was a lot closer to death than he seemed to be. She didn't bother looking at the blade as she set it aside on a small table, exchanging it for the small cloth she had used earlier to rouse him.

"D?" she murmured as she carefully tried to wipe the blood away from the wound in his abdomen. She watched nervously as it began to seal itself, his regenerative powers seeming to take an eternity by her standards before the flow of blood eventually stopped. She knew the internal damage wouldn't be repaired so quickly, but at least he wouldn't be losing any more of his blood.

"I'm sorry about that, but I kind of had to let her do that," she said to him in a quiet, almost subdued tone as she dipped the bloody rag in the bowl of water and started to gingerly rinse his chest. She paused as he made a very dry rasping noise and glanced around for something to use as a cup. Seeing nothing immediately available, she settled for scooping up a handful of water from the bowl and splashing it against his lips. "Easy," she murmured as she spent the next couple of minutes giving him handfuls of water to help quench his burning thirst.

"There you go," she purred as she rinsed the cloth again and carefully started to clean his upper back. "You'll be alright, D. Believe me when I say I'm not going to let you die on me. You're just a little too important to me, now that I have you. Damn, you're a tough one," she added as she noticed how the welts on his back had already started to heal.

She blinked hard as she heard him whisper her name, a sound that was all but incomprehensible given the way his throat rasped as he forced out the pair of syllables. "Don't," she said quickly as she came back around to the front and ran the cloth over the base of his throat. "Don't try to talk, D, I know you're not up to it yet."

She blinked again as he somehow summoned the strength to lift his head up, just enough to look into her pale yellow eyes. "Wh... what... do... you... wh... want?" he rasped. It was obvious that the effort was costing him dearly in terms of pain, his corneas starting to flicker blue in time with his pulse.

"D..." Coral started to say before falling silent, one hand reaching up to lightly touch his cheek. The gesture was a gentle one, almost like a caress as her fingertips lightly probed the spot on his jaw where she had struck him last night. The faintest of smiles brushed her lips as she continued to study him, still not believing that she had actually managed to capture him.

She finally drew in a breath and looked him in the eyes, almost choking with anxiety at how intently he was looking back at her. "As I told my sister, I'll explain it all to you later," she said, her voice scarcely more than a whisper. "But know that I have no wish to harm you. I've dreamt about being able to meet you for years now, ever since... well," she said as the smile briefly faltered before reasserting itself, "Let's just say I've been waiting for just the right moment. Waiting, all this time..."

Even through the haze of pain that threatened to send him over the edge and into the abyss of unconsciousness at any moment, he could still sense that there was something very wrong with her whole demeanor. His initial impression of Pearl had proven to be accurate in terms of her hatred for him and her own fires of rage, but understanding Coral continued to be an elusive task. Maybe it would all make sense once his body healed enough so that he could stop and think like a rational and sentient entity once again, but right now he was simply in too much pain to both think and keep his vampiric side under control. The latter was far more important to him, as he knew that it was liable to be the death of him if it got out of control and tried to go on a rampage in his current environment.

He paused and refocused on her as she giggled very softly to herself, a look of idle amusement reflected in her eyes as she tilted her head slightly to study him. "You're absolutely amazing, you know that?" she murmured quietly as she picked up the cloth and started to tenderly rinse the dried blood off of his arm. "I've seen her flay a battle-hardened knight before, and he screamed his throat apart after only going through a third of what you just did. I'm quite impressed, D, you are everything that the legends have said and more."

She giggled softly again before the cloth slid down to his abdomen, very carefully passing over the angry red mark where the dagger had been thrust past his kidneys and narrowly avoided shredding his intestines. An icy chill ran down his spine as her hand moved lower, her fingertip slipping inside the edge of his ruined underwear and giving the elastic an experimental tug.

"Oops," she purred very softly as the material fell away from his body as a single unit, apparently held in place only by its weight, friction, and maybe even a touch of static electricity. He was essentially naked now, save for a few small scraps of cloth that still clung to his arms and shoulders, and he only needed a single glance at the look in her eyes to know that it was not an accident that she had forbidden Pearl from injuring him in the groin.

"Well, well, what have we here?" Coral cooed as she leaned over to him, her lips almost brushing the shell of his ear as the cloth was dunked in the bowl of water once again. "I guess the rest of the stories are just as true, then, hmm?" she said as he felt the cloth brushing over his waistline where the elastic had been. "But then again, I already knew that. I see you know what I'm talking about," she added coyly as she caught the look in his eyes as her hand very slowly worked its way downward.

"Rest assured, hunter, I will not hurt you," she said, letting just a single fingertip trace the length of his manhood before bringing the damp cloth back up to very carefully try to brush against his chest. The pressure of her hand in badly bruised territory caused him to hiss slightly, resulting in her jerking back in a startled motion. "Well, not intentionally," she amended with a slightly embarrassed look.

He remained silent as she edged back to study him, her gaze seeming to wander across the whole of his body. He was only faintly surprised when her gaze didn't linger on his exposed manhood, continuing to roam around at random before coming to rest on his own eyes once again. A truly dark chill shot down his spine as she gave him an odd smile, the faintest of twinkles forming in her eyes to suggest that she was up to something. And if his instincts were even remotely close to being correct, he was definitely not going to like finding out just what it was that she ultimately wanted from him.

He blinked as she suddenly yawned, a faint frown forming on her lips as she turned her head to one side and discreetly covered her mouth. "Oh, my," she sighed as she turned back to give him an apologetic look. "I do believe I may be getting too old for this kind of thing. Granted I'm only a hundred and thirty, but staying out in the sun all day and then staying awake through the entire night to keep working until sunrise isn't something I can do like I used to when I was a little girl. No matter, sleep will come soon enough and I'll bet you could use a nap yourself right now, hmm?"

D was probably sure he had enough energy by now to speak out and ask her a question, or at least get enough words out for her to understand him, but he remained silent as she headed over to the series of levers that he could barely see out of the corner of his eye. He supposed that he might have been able to see them better if he moved his head, but right now he didn't want to risk even the slightest loss of energy from muscle movement unless he had to. He could literally feel his insides mending, one fleshy fiber at a time, which bothered him greatly as he couldn't ever remembering being that badly injured before to where the regeneration could be measurably felt.

There was a clicking sound and suddenly the floor beneath D's feet opened up to reveal a truly deep tunnel. The realization made him jerk back slightly in a reflex before his mind clamped down on the initial fear of falling. Had he been standing on the floor he would have been sent tumbling into the tunnel, but he was still chained to the metal columns and support shelf. He blinked as he suddenly saw light at the bottom, realizing after a few moments that he was suspended over a tunnel that opened out over the bottom of the continental rift where Baron Winters' castle had been situated.

"Yes, it's a long drop," Coral assured him as she carefully peered over the edge. "This whole place used to be volcanic at some point, and the room we're in now was a lava bubble that solidified ages ago. All we needed to do was refurbish it a little, shore up the floors and walls for ambience, and our little playground was born. The tunnel used to be a lava tube, and as you can see it stretches the full length of the canyon cliffs here. It makes for a great garbage-disposal system, don't you think?" she purred as she picked up the chunk of his pants that she had pulled off him earlier and tossed it into the void.

D couldn't help watching the fabric as it fluttered through the air on its way down, seeming to take forever before it flashed in the sunlight and finally disappeared from view. It had to be at least two thousand feet straight down, if not more, and not something he wished to contemplate falling into. Perhaps he might have stood a remote chance of surviving the fall, depending on how close to the canyon wall he could remain to try to brake or otherwise control his freefall, but in his current condition...

A second clicking sound caused him to look up, first up towards her, then up higher still as a bright light suddenly lanced down from the ceiling. His skin immediately started to tingle moments later as he realized that the lava tube continued up through the ceiling and that a hatch of some sort had been built into it. The hatch was open now, allowing the bright rays of the sun to shine down into the tube and illuminate him in its searing light.

"As you can see," Coral purred softly, "The tube goes clear through the lava bubble and up to the top of the canyon. Mmm, that's bright," she added as she held her ungloved hand out in the light. "You'd be surprised at what you can do with a few mirrors in just the right places. In any case, D, I'm going to have to leave you here like this until I can come back for you once the sun sets. Oh, don't look at me like that," she sighed as he glanced back down at her sharply.

"You see," she said quietly as she reached out to stroke his cheek, "I know how strong you are, D, and I can't risk letting you regain your strength just yet. Don't worry, it'll be overcast soon, so you won't have to worry about heat exposure just yet. Okay, you might wind up with a bit of a sun-tan before nightfall, but I think it would look good on you," she purred as she let her fingertips trace the outlines of his arm muscles. "But I'll take care of you once the moon rises, I promise. You can trust me, D," she murmured as she leaned over to kiss him.

He jerked his head back to avoid letting his lips contact hers, ignoring the sudden creaking of his neck joint and the sparks of pain that the movement caused. She paused and blinked at the gesture, easing her head back with a look of surprise in her eyes.

"D, don't do that, I'm not going to bite you," she said demurely as she leaned forward again. She sighed as he again resisted the contact, twisting his head to one side with a grimace of pain as the tendons in his neck made a rather hideous cracking sound. "Very well," she said as she leaned back, her expression slipping into a truly disappointed pout with a quiet sigh. "But do think about it, okay?" she whispered as she reached up to squeeze his arm. "I won't be truly ready for another few days, but still... think about it?"

He remained silent as she stepped back, holding onto his chains with one hand for balance and stability so she wouldn't fall into the gaping tunnel that lay open beneath his feet. "I'll send Abby to check on you in a few hours," she said quietly as she gazed at him, an unknown emotion starting to form in her pale yellow eyes. "She'll close the roof if the sun is too strong. Try to sleep well, D, for tonight is going to be... fun," she whispered, a chilling smile brushing her lips. "I promise."

It was all D could do to remain impassive as she turned away and left the room in silence, her footsteps barely making any noise whatsoever. The door seemed to creak ominously as it was opened, allowing her to step inside the archway before pausing to cast a final look at him. He wasn't entirely sure what to make of the way she smiled at him and wiggled her fingers in a wave before she vanished from sight and shut the door behind her, but the way the door clicked loudly a few seconds later spoke volumes of his true situation.

((D?)) it spoke up in a very uneasy voice after a few moments of silence.

"Quiet," D managed to rasp in a broken whisper as his eyes closed.

((For god's sake, D...)) it tried to say.

"You must stay quiet," D said, ignoring the burning agony in his throat as he forced his vocal chords to work. "If they find you..."

((Yeah, I think I got the picture thirty minutes ago,)) it replied in a very quiet voice. ((Look, just stay quiet and listen to me for a few, okay? Here's the bad news, she wasn't kidding about the composition of those chains. Pure titanium smelted around pure adamantium cores. If you're thinking about trying to break them somehow? Don't bother, it just ain't going to happen.

((But get this... not all of it is what they think it is,)) it added, the faint note of hope in its voice causing D's eyes to open just slightly. ((The chains on your left wrist are like everything else... but not the bolts that attach them to the band around your wrist. The other sets are titanium, but the ones here were replaced with carbon-tempered iron. You might be able to pop them if you had your full strength back, but you'd be just as liable to snap your wrist in half as well. I don't recommend hinging any plans around it, but it's still a weakness to keep in mind.))

"Thanks," D murmured as he closed his eyes again. The information wasn't as useful as he had hoped, but like the knowledge of his sword being relatively close at hand, it was still just comforting enough to help take the edge off. "Can you reach my gear?" he rasped.

((Uh, not by any stretch of the imagination,)) it sighed. ((I think she did it on purpose, too, just to tease you. D, all jokes aside, you've got to keep an eye on her. Pearl is just like any other rabid dunpeal you've dealt with, but I've got a very bad feeling about Coral. You know she's got some kind of controlling hypnosis power going, right?))

"How so?" D asked softly. The sunlight beating down on him wasn't too strong, or at least not yet, but it didn't need to be strong to concern him at the moment. Unless the clouds came soon, he well and truly didn't think he could withstand a full hour of sunlight before heat exposure would overcome him and that would be it. Had he been otherwise healthy he might have been able to recover from heat exposure with the right assistance, but with his grip on the warmth of life currently little more than a rapidly-fraying thread...

((I felt it as a tingle in my nervous system, which we both know is quite different than yours,)) it explained. ((That's actually a good thing, since I'd have been screaming louder than you were had our nervous systems been fully linked. D, about that...)) it suddenly said in a concerned tone. ((Look, with as long as we've been together and all...))

"Quiet," D murmured softly. Already the sunlight was making his skin itch and burn, and he knew that it would only continue to erode what little control he had left. "Just stay hidden until I need you."

((D...)) it said in a pained whisper. ((Just... hang in there, okay? Not that we have much of a choice, all things considered, but... Eh?)) it said as D's chest convulsed once before becoming still again. It remained silent for several moments before it finally dared to speak again. ((D... tell me that wasn't a laugh at what I said.))

D said nothing as he tried to force his mind to shut down, attempting to enter a dormant state akin to sleep. The pain in his body would guarantee that true sleep would evade him for some time, and the constant exposure to sunlight would only further add to his problems, but he knew that he had to at least try to conserve as much energy as he could. Perhaps the night would offer some sort of respite from the mortal agony he was in, and at this point he would not have refused the relief of death. He had long ago come to terms with the idea that one day he might make a mistake in his quest or simply be out-powered by one of ancient nobles he sought to destroy. That his demise would appear to be at the hands of another dunpeal and a woman at that only bothered him slightly, or at least the first part. He knew how strong dunpeals could be, being one himself, and he had long known that women were extremely dangerous entities.

((D?)) it said, the voice seeming to be quite distant and fuzzy now as he felt his consciousness starting to slip. Granted it was a deliberate action, or so he dearly hoped, but no doubt that it would upset the parasite in his hand who likely wasn't aware of his thoughts. ((Stay with me here...))

It seemed to take forever for his body to go numb enough for his mind to fade to black, finally allowing him some measure of relief from the constant searing pain of his flesh and broken body. Part of him knew that it wasn't a good development, as feeling pain meant you were still alive. But still, even he needed a respite from such duress, didn't he? Surely everyone knew that a dunpeal like him had his limits. Hadn't Pearl proved that?

Pearl. He had seen the look in her eyes when she had stabbed him and he refused to cry out, sacrificing every remaining thread of his willpower to keep his breath in his lungs and his pain in that iron box. Twisting the knife had broken him, of course, but there had still been that glimmer of respect and awe in her eyes... Could he use that? Coral seemed to be able to control her, so that meant her willpower was pliant. Perhaps he could use that...

Perhaps he could. Use Pearl.

Perhaps.

Per. haps.

per...

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 


	3. Descent into Madness

Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust "Blood Ties"

by Troy A. Stanton note: This fanfic follows the events of the original stories "Winds of Change" and "Final Hours" (both written by me), and also incorporates a few elements from the story "Drawing Blood" by Catherine B. Krusberg. I have her permission to make use of her work as a source of material, so anything 'new' you see in here about D's past with Doris that didn't happen in the movie is most likely her original plot material.)

WARNING: This story contains graphic violence and adult content, please do not read beyond this point if you are easily offended by such things.

((Chapter Three - Descent into Madness))

"Stay strong, D..."

He wasn't sure he had heard the words to begin with, let alone who might have spoken them or how long ago. He vaguely was aware of the passage of time as he slowly drifted back up from the depths of near-oblivion and into searing consciousness. The pain had never truly left him, but it was as if a switch had been thrown and the feelings all rushed back to him as a single unit. For one bleak moment he feared that he would succumb to them and what was left of his mind would driven back over the precipice into total oblivion.

The pain remained with him, however, an oddly comforting feeling that was an undeniable indication that he was still very much alive. Whether that was a good thing or not was very much open to debate, but he had neither the energy nor the willpower to spare for such an internal philosophical argument. All he was capable of at the moment was existing in a sea of agony that very slowly began to recede, one white-hot needle of searing pain at a time.

Eventually he became aware of a sound, a low and rhythmic thrum that was more felt than heard. It surprised him to realize that it was his own heart, the muscle continuing to beat at a steady and unceasing pace. A distant part of his still-awakening mind knew that he had almost perfect mastery of how his body operated when he focused hard enough, but that his heart was one of the few aspects of him that he had never been able to directly control. Influence, yes, but not command or dominate.

An eternity passed as he simply listened to the steady mantra, the sound never once ceasing or wavering in the slightest. He knew that his heart would fight to the very end to continue beating, sacrificing all else until there was quite literally no energy left in it for the next contraction. The knowledge that his heart continued to beat started to revitalize his mind, knowing that if an uncontrollable force like his heart could continue to persevere in the face of constant nerve-searing agony, then he could do so too. Granted he was comprised of far more than simply his heart muscle, but he had learned long ago that when there was a will, there was a way.

He began to reach out with his mind, seeking to embrace everything that it could. The pain was the easiest to focus on, of course, but he soon could feel impulses that were almost but not quite masked by the constant flood of agony. His skin hurt like hell, but he could tell it was still largely intact. Burned by exposure to the sun and mostly bruised from being whipped, but still whole.

His chest felt... odd. The constant fire of his cracked ribs had faded down to a dull roar, sort of like the burning embers left behind after a fire consumed most of the fuel around it. It took him a moment to realize that the sensation was variable, as if it were actively coming and going. It took him longer still to realize that it was doing so because someone was touching his chest carefully, probing him for any indications of a reaction.

That was enough to prod his mind into almost perfect consciousness in the blink of an eye, awakening his senses so quickly that he was almost immediately stunned by the flood of information that came back at him. The end result was that he wound back up in a mild daze before things very slowly began to resolve into some semblance of order that his mind could process effectively.

"Oh!" a feminine voice exclaimed softly in surprise as D twitched and drew in what sounded like a very painful breath of air. "Are you awake, D?"

His eyes parted of their own volition, resulting in a blur of color that required several slow blinks to resolve into a modicum of focus. A dark swath of deep purple finally took shape in front of him, accompanied by slender pale tracts of color that confused him until he realized that he was looking at the torso of a woman wearing a purple evening dress.

"My, you're awake early," the voice commented. "Well, maybe not," she added as the unique tingle of the setting sun suddenly shot through him. The feeling was almost lost amid the constant waves of pain still besieging him, but it was still distinctive enough to make itself known. The simple knowledge that the sun had set brought him an immense feeling of comfort, knowing that he was safe from further burning for at least another ten hours or so.

Or so he thought.

"He seems out of it," another voice commented idly. There was a slight pause as he heard a faint rasping of metal, like a lid being unscrewed from a jar before the voice added, "Here, this will wake him up for sure."

"Pearl?" the first voice suddenly said in a concerned tone. "Wait, what is that... PEARL!"

For an instant, D thought she had simply splashed the front of his chest with room-temperature water. That would have made sense, as water tossed on a sleeping individual tends to wake them up painlessly with only a minor mess to cope with. When his skin suddenly seemed to ignite and burn like it was being seared by the sun itself, however, he realized that it hadn't been ordinary water splashed against him but water that had first been boiled beneath a solar convection mirror and later imbued with spiritual energy. Holy water.

Had he been prepared for such a drastic surge in pain, he might have been able to stave off the throat-rending scream that erupted from his chest with all the force and grace of a panicked stampede of cattle. The rest of his body thrashed back and forth in a reflex, trying to throw off the shackles that kept him bound and wipe off the liquid hellfire that ran the length of his chest. So intense was the unholy pain that he almost missed the sharp curse from the first woman as she frantically splashed ordinary water against him to try to rinse the acid-like holy water off.

Her efforts only changed the focus of the pain, letting the worst of it abate from his chest while forcing the liquid to flow down and coat the rest of his abdomen and legs to make the previously unaffected skin burn like it was on fire. Unlike his chest, however, the pain didn't linger for very long as Coral continued to scoop out handfuls of water to dilute and rinse away the lingering traces of the holy water. Eventually the majority of the intense burning passed, leaving behind seared and aching swaths of flesh that almost literally glowed a bright pink color. Drained by both the primal scream and the burning pain, D half-collapsed and hung as limply as the chains would allow him with his mind once again teetering on the brink of unconsciousness.

"What the hell did you think you were doing?" Coral snarled as she turned on Pearl, grabbing her by the front of her dark blouse.

"He's awake now, isn't he?" Pearl replied in a tone of feigned innocence.

"I will not say this again," Coral said in a very low tone, audibly trying to temper her anger with a note of reasonableness. "He is mine and I will not have him crippled before I'm finished with him. If you can't play by my rules, little sister, then I'm afraid you can't play with him at all."

"What the hell is your problem, sis?" Pearl demanded with a faint snarl, reaching up to try to break her sister's grip on the front of her shirt. The gesture was abandoned after a few moments when it became obvious that Coral had no intentions of letting go just yet.

"The problem, my dear Pearl," Coral said quietly in an odd tone, "Is that I need him alive and intact. Give me a few days and then we can talk about how to dispose of him, but not before then. Stop and think what has been done to him so far. First crushed, then whipped, then stabbed, then left out in the sun for longer than I had anticipated, and now this? Where did you get that stuff, anyway?" she added in a genuinely curious tone.

"You'd be surprised by what you can find being sold in the village," Pearl replied tartly as she made another attempt at loosening her sister's iron grip on her blouse. "Look, he's still quite alive and I got to hear him scream once again, that's all I wanted from him. You're the one who said he should be kept weak so he can't hurt us, so why are you getting all uptight on me when I do just what my big sister wanted me to do?"

Coral growled dangerously before she released her grip with a slight shove that rocked Pearl back on her heels. "You know, Pearl, I've never made it a secret that I envy your skill with certain weapons. Maybe I just got the short end of the stick when it came to such things, but you've always had a certain finesse that I never could match. However, in spite of all that, you don't seem to understand that you also need to use a very delicate touch when doing something like this. You can't use brute force because the slightest mistake or miscalculation can kill."

"So what's the downside?" Pearl muttered as she cast a dark glare at D. She paused and felt the faintest of chills run down her spine as she realized that he was looking at them, his dark eyes barely open but still seeming to be lucid enough to be aware of what was taking place around him.

Pearl's attention was returned to Coral when the other woman reached out to lightly take hold of her chin, gently twisting her head around so that their eyes met once more. "I need him, Pearl," the gray-haired woman whispered in an almost velvety tone. "I will explain it all later, I promise, but for now all that you truly need to know is that I need him alive for the present. Yes, you are right, he does need to be kept weak enough to not be able to resist us, but he still needs to have some strength left available to him for later. Let me make you a deal, dear sister," she purred in a honeyed tone.

"I'm listening," Pearl growled quietly as she felt the back of her left hand start to itch all of a sudden. Maybe it's just an allergic reaction to that tone, she found herself thinking. It's possible, as Father was allergic to carnations and other vampires had been known to be allergic to the damnedest of mundane things...

"If D gets to be too unruly, you can come put him back in his place using whatever means you desire," Coral breathed huskily. "But as long as I can keep him on a suitably short leash, you can't use anything that would hurt him. Too badly," she added with a faint giggle. "You can slap him around like a cheap whore if it pleases you, but I am quite serious about no injury being done to his face. He has such a handsome look, don't you agree?" she purred.

Pearl cast a glance towards D, one ghostly pale-blue eyebrow arching up as she saw the corner of his mouth twitch just slightly. "Perhaps," she allowed in a neutral tone devoid of any hint of emotion. "But on one condition," she said in an edged tone as she looked back at Coral.

"Depending," Coral replied, surprised by her sister's response.

"If you do decide to kill him? I get to handle that," Pearl stated as her eyes seemed to blaze for a brief instant with crimson fire.

Coral blinked at the vehemence in her sister's voice before sighing and seeming to wither slightly like a delicate flower exposed to desert heat. "Oh, all right," she yielded in a weary tone. "You can kill him should it come to that. I wouldn't start holding my breath anytime soon, though," she admonished the other woman in a moderate tone.

"Fine," Pearl agreed as she crossed her arms tightly over her chest and cast yet another dark glare towards D. "He's awake, you know," she pointed out almost absently as she started to study the odd splash-pattern of reddened skin on his chest and upper legs.

"Yes, I know," Coral murmured as she briefly glanced at D's body as well. "I'll be with you in a few moments, D, I still have to finish taking care of some minor business first," she called out, giving him the faintest of smiles.

"Such as...?" Pearl prompted without taking her eyes off D.

"We need to do something about the road," Coral said, gesturing over her shoulder to what seemed to be the ceiling. "It'll take a construction team a few days to put the ballast rock back in position and cement it in place, but at least we can start by cleaning it up and patching the road surface. Did you see the crater that was left when it fell?"

Pearl promptly blinked hard and cast a startled look at Coral. "What?"

Coral sighed and turned to face her sister. "Surely you remember how I dropped part of the archway onto D yesterday?" she prodded in a patient tone. "Well, it's still sitting there and the horse carcass is probably starting to reek now. Since we don't want that stink to filter its way down here, to say nothing of the buzzards and flies it'll draw soon, we need to dispose of it and get it all cleaned up. The carriage remains, too," she added lightly.

The edges of Pearl's lips turned up slightly. "I'll just need a dustpan to clean up what's left of Celene, but I see what you mean about the rest of the mess. Let me guess, you want me to take care of it, right?"

A quiet chuckle rose up from Coral's chest as she smoothed her hands over the front of her satin gown. "I'm sure you can... entice a few strapping young men from the village to help you in your task," she purred in a honeyed tone. "You can probably even offer them a piece of a sexy young blonde as payment for their diligent efforts..."

Pearl threw her head back and laughed, a somewhat dark and sinister sound that sounded distinctly cruel to D's ears. "Oh, Coral, you are so wicked at times, you know that?" she said, giving her older sister a distinctly feral grin that exposed the very tips of her fangs.

"What can I say?" Coral replied with an exaggerated shrug. "It runs in the family." The two sisters shared a distinctly dark laugh for a number of moments before Coral made a slight gesture with her chin. "You may as well go now while the night is still young and the farm-hands are still awake. I'll take care of D, so he should be somewhat refreshed by the time you return to play with him some more."

"Mmm hmm," Pearl said absently, her dark humor almost evaporating in an instant as she glanced back at D. She paused and cast a sidelong glance at her sister as Coral took her hand gently, giving it a soft squeeze.

"You need to relax," Coral murmured quietly. "There is much he and I need to talk about first, or at least once his throat heals again, and I did promise you that you could play with him some more later. But you know how men are, they give you five minutes of entertainment and then they need to rest for an hour or two afterwards," she observed with a wicked twinkle in her eye.

"Something like that," Pearl muttered in reply as she glanced away.

"Have Abby come down here with the mud I asked her to mix up on your way upstairs," Coral said as she squeezed her hand gently before letting go and taking a step back. "Our guest here looks like he could use a bath."

"I'll bet," the aqua-eyed woman said absently as she cast another brief look at D. She started to turn away to head towards the door when she stopped and turned the other way, heading instead over to where D was chained to the metal columns.

Coral's eyebrows promptly arched up as Pearl seemed to study him for a moment before drawing her hand back to deliver a back-handed blow to his cheek. The blow was hardly a powerful one, but it was still strong enough to rock him sideways and into the support column before hanging limply again. "Hmm?" Coral inquired with a loud hum of curiosity.

Pearl turned around and gave her sister a shrug. "You said I could slap him around like a cheap whore," she pointed out in a casual tone as she started to cross the room towards the door.

"Aye, that I did," Coral admitted frankly with a slight shrug of her own. She waited until she heard the metal door closing behind her before she shook her head to herself and sighed loudly. "Oh, what am I going to do with her?" she asked aloud, more to the room in general than to D. "No matter. So let's see how you're doing this evening, shall we?" she said as she strode over to D and tilted his head up, peering into his eyes.

A quiet grunt rose up from her throat as she could clearly see where every drop of the holy water had come into contact with his skin. Nobody was quite sure why such things affected vampires and dunpeals with equal measure, burning both like liquid sunlight to sear the skin and leave them dangerously weakened. All that mattered was that it did, which made it quite a dangerous substance to handle for those with vampiric blood in their veins. Even werewolves, who were tainted with a completely different kind of blood-curse and thus were all but immune to that which could injure or kill a vampire, tended to tread carefully when around even smallest of vials of the purified and sanctified water.

"D?" she said quietly, pausing just slightly as he lifted his eyes up to look directly at her. "I'm sorry about what happened earlier. I didn't know she had picked up some holy water or I would have forbade her from using it. She damn near splashed it on me as well," she groused as she cast a glance at her left hand, blinking as she saw a tiny freckle-sized red mark on her skin where her elbow-length glove ended. "Oh, I guess she did splash me after all. Odd that I didn't notice until now... Hmm?" she added as she heard the door creaking open, lifting up her head to discover her favorite slave entering the room holding a rather large ceramic urn.

D cast a reflexive glance towards the source of the sound as well, feeling the contents of his stomach start to congeal into an icy slush. Women tended to be the favorite kind of prey for vampires of both sexes, and so it didn't surprise him to see that Coral's slave was female. What bothered him deeply though was how young the girl looked, seeming to be fifteen if that much. Her attire bothered him even more, or rather the lack of it as she was essentially wearing only a gauzy loin-cloth held in place by a thin silver chain wrapped around her slender hips.

"Coral?" the girl piped up, her voice marred slightly by the strain of carrying the urn as she carefully walked across the floor. D realized that she was barefoot as well, which explained her ginger steps as she crossed the cold stone flooring.

"Over here, Abby," Coral said as she stepped forward to take the urn from her, almost effortlessly carrying it back over to where D was chained. The girl cast a quick glance at D while her mistress' back was turned, a look of unease evident in her vibrant blue eyes as she regarded him carefully. If she was bothered by her seven-eighths or his complete nudity, she didn't give him any indication of it. Her flaxen hair had been brushed out and tied off behind her with a simple blue ribbon, making her seem more like a china doll than a child slave. Her breasts, no longer hidden by the mass of the urn, were little more than subtle swells topped by fairly large nipples that jutted out in stark contrast to the rest of her shallow curves, further emphasizing D's assessment that she was still more of a child than a woman.

A quick glance at the girl's throat chilled D's blood even further, able to make out the subtle network of scars on both sides where she had been bitten in the jugular more than once in the past. He thought he saw a faint mark on the right side of her neck, suggesting that she had recently been bitten by a vampiric entity. He felt it was horrific enough for anyone to have to endure the kiss of a vampire once in his or her life, but to repeatedly be leeched of the life-blood in her veins, especially at such a young age...

"There we go," Coral purred as she straightened up and turned around to give Abelyne a gentle smile. "Thank you, Abby, that should be all I need for awhile. Wait, where are the brushes?" she asked as she twisted around to peer inside the urn.

"Inside the urn," Abelyne replied as she absently reached over to scratch the back of her left hand for a moment.

"Never mind, I see them," Coral said as she turned back around to smile at the young girl again. "If you want, you can go ahead and tell April to start breakfast for the both of you. I'll probably be down here all night, so don't worry about waiting for me. Just have her set aside a portion for Pearl and I'll handle things myself if I get too hungry or anything. Oh, and do let her know that dinner last night was absolutely wonderful. I take it she used those Westfield potatoes?"

"I think so," Abelyne replied, keeping her gaze on her mistress. "I'll have to ask her to be certain, though."

"Expensive, but worthwhile," Coral commented with an absent nod. "We'll have to see about getting some more before the season is out. In any case, you should go back upstairs now. I'll let you know if I need anything else."

"Okay," the young girl replied before casting the briefest of glances over at D before turning to leave. She froze in mid-motion as Coral noticed the look and called to her. "Yes?" she said as she glanced back at the baroness.

"You don't need to worry about our guest," Coral purred in a silken tone. "He's not going to harm you or anyone else. Run along now."

"Okay," Abelyne replied in a carefree tone as she turned away and left the room, apparently without thinking further of the matter. The loincloth seemed to flutter slightly as she padded across the stone floor, offering alert eyes a few brief and tantalizing glimpses of what little flesh she had that wasn't out on display to begin with. The door creaked slightly behind her as it was shut, leaving Coral alone with D in the underground dungeon.

Coral purred quietly to herself as she turned her attention to the urn and carefully extracted the pair of heavy brushes inside. "It's almost a shame how good girls like her are awful hard to find these days," she mused as she dabbed the larger of the two brushes in the mud to scoop up a blob. She then turned to D and was poised to smear the mud over his arm when she saw the dark glare he was giving her. "Something on your mind, D?" she inquired carefully.

She waited patiently for him to answer, a small frown crossing her face as he turned away and remained silent. She cast a glance down at the mud-coated brush she was holding before sighing and setting it back inside the urn. She then moved over to stand in front of him, gently tilting his head up so that their eyes met.

"D?" she said softly. "I know you have a reputation for silence, even in the face of adversity, but you need to answer if someone asks you a question. I take it you don't like my pretty Abelyne?"

"Why do you keep her as a slave?" D whispered, his voice dangerously raw and tinged with pain as he gave Coral a look that was clearly unfriendly.

Coral shrugged absently, the casualness of the gesture causing D to blink in response. "She was an orphan when I encountered her," she replied as she leaned forward, just enough to reach into the urn to retrieve the brush. "What was I supposed to do, leave her to die in the ruins where I found her? The same goes for my darling little April as well, both found all alone late at night in places where they almost certainly would have become werewolf food or something before the week was out. Certainly you know just how wonderfully delicious a young girl's blood tastes, hmm?" she mused lightly as she started to spread the mud across D's arm.

"A young woman's blood, perhaps," D rasped as he cast a suspicious glance at the dark clay-like mud being brushed against him. "But not a child's," he added, allowing a hint of his anger to color his tone.

"Oh, they're hardly children now," Coral replied absently as she focused on her work, trying to spread an even coating of the mud across his skin. She paused to scoop up more of the mud before continuing to speak. "April will be eighteen soon, stunning creature that she is, and my dearest Abby just turned seventeen. Yes," she added as she saw D blink in surprise. "She's older than she looks, but most think she is still merely a precocious child of twelve or thirteen. Permit her to have enough sugar and she acts like it, too," she muttered with a somewhat rueful chuckle as she scooped up more mud.

"I hope you don't mind me doing this," she said conversationally as she continued to coat his arm with the hydrated dirt-and-clay mixture. "I'm not about to unbind you to let you rest in the embrace of the soil just yet, but we've discovered that a mud-bath goes a long way in restoring the vitality of youth. And not just because it absolutely obliterates wrinkles in the skin," she added with a faint giggle and a somewhat sultry glance.

D said nothing as he cast a glance towards his equipment in the distance, absently trying to gauge the distance. He finally settled on twenty-five feet before sighing silently and closing his eyes, trying to rest. The pain from being splashed with holy water was all but gone now, save for a few unusually sore spots on his chest where he had also been hit the hardest by the falling rock. The searing agony of his ribs had likewise faded in intensity, though he could still feel it quite keenly whenever he tried to draw in a deep breath. The constant weight on his ankles, however, seemed to be preventing them from trying to recover, resulting in a constant barrage of needle-like twinges of pain that made it hard to focus his thoughts for any great length of time.

"So what do you think of my sister?" Coral spoke up as she finished with his left arm and moved behind him to start working on his right shoulder. She paused after a few moments when she realized that he hadn't tried to reply to her yet, using the blunt tip of the brush to poke him in the lower back in the general area of his kidneys. "D, I asked you a question," she prodded in a somewhat unamused tone.

"She's no different from any other dunpeal," D spoke up without bothering to open his eyes, his tone utterly devoid of any hint or semblance of emotion.

"That doesn't sound encouraging," Coral observed lightly as she continued her work. "Surely there has to be something about her that sets her apart from the others of our kind that you've met. Honestly, how many other dunpeals have you met that are skilled with crossbows and whips like that?"

"Several," D replied after a slight hesitation.

"A pity," Coral sighed. "And here I was thinking that my little sister had been given a truly special gift. Oh, well, she's still special to me and Father. Well, I suppose I should say to just me now, seeing how Father isn't with us any longer. A shame, really," she sighed as she scooped up more of the mud and continued to coat his arm, carefully wedging some of the material in the very narrow gap between the adamantium band and his wrist.

D would have cast a slightly disturbed sidelong glance at her had his eyes been open, trying to figure out what to make of her attitude. He still didn't think that she held any animosity towards her vampire father, but her lack of concern or caring over his death made him wonder about her state of mind. It was something to think about, and seeing how there was very little he could do about his present situation he didn't see any reason not to try to devote his mental focus to figuring her out.

"Ah, dammit," Coral sighed as she stepped back, causing D to open his eyes and glance over at her. "I knew I shouldn't have picked a dress for this."

A simple glance down at her slightly extended leg revealed the cause of her concern, a small dark speckle of mud that had dripped off at some point to land on her evening gown. He dismissed it as inconsequential and started to close his eyes again when she made a rather ugly snarling noise to herself, sounding more like an upset werewolf than an irked dunpeal. Already wary with the situation, he kept his eyes open so that he could follow her movements.

"Hell with it," she sighed as she reached up and placed the brush in his right hand. "Hold this for me, will you?" she said absently as she took a short step back and reached behind her to try to grab the zipper.

Startled by the move, D absently kept his grip on the brush as he watched her pull the zipper down to the base of her spine. The dress was promptly slipped off of her shoulders and pushed down far enough to where she could step out of it, leaving her clad in a dark purple bra and matching panties. Both undergarments appeared to be made out of the same satin-like material as the dress, shimmering faintly in the dim light cast by the torches spaced out along the dungeon walls at regular intervals.

She carefully folded the dress and set it aside before standing up to look at him, a coy smile brushing her lips as she noticed his attention. Her boots were made of black leather and came up a few inches past her ankles, while the elbow-length glove on her left arm appeared to be lambskin. "You like?" she purred softly, almost seductively as she carefully posed for him, letting him see the majority of her curves. "D?" she said in a faint lilt as he once again remained silent. "Come now, be honest with me. What do you think?"

"Purple suits you," he rasped quietly, keeping his eyes on hers. He knew there was a number of things that he could have said that would not have been either a lie or aggravating to say, but something in the back of his mind was warning him to still tread as lightly as possible until he got a better idea of what her state of mind was like.

"Mmmmmmm, thank you," Coral purred as she moved to take the brush from him. The reminder of the forgotten brush almost came as a physical shock, not believing that he had been able to forget about such a simple thing as what he was holding in his hand. The analytical portion of his mind immediately edged the threat potential up a notch and suggested that he try to be more vigilant in the future. Granted he had rarely been distracted before by a woman who had cause or otherwise felt the need to undress in his presence, but the symbiot's warning about how she seemed to possess a hypnotic controlling power of some kind suddenly took on a higher note of importance.

"Pearl seems to think it clashes with my eyes," Coral continued in a soft, almost seductive tone as she resumed the task of covering D's body in mud. She finished his arm with a simple flourish and took a step back to try to decide where she wanted to start next, dipping the brush in the mud before smearing the dark sludge across the base of his throat. "But both April and Abelyne have said they like the effect as well. Not that purple is an ideal color to begin with, or so they say, but I think they know fashion when they see it. And I'm glad that you do as well," she added as her voice softened by several degrees, almost becoming inaudible.

D remained silent as the baroness began to quietly hum to herself, her mind obviously drifting at random as she painted line after line of the dark mud across his neck and upper chest. She had coated half of his chest before she blinked hard, a thought visibly forming in her eyes that snapped her out of her reverie and back into cohesive focus. She glanced up at him in concern for an instant before she carefully reached out to lightly tap his sternum with a fingertip.

"Oooh," she winced as D made a soft hissing noise at the explosion of pain that swept across his chest. "Still a little tender, I take it? D?" she added in a faintly edged tone when she didn't get an immediate response.

"So it seems," D said in a neutral tone, not wanting to give her any sort of indication as to just how badly he was still hurt. The pain wasn't nearly as bad as it had been earlier in the day when Pearl had pressed against him, but it still was sharp enough to indicate that he likely still had a few small fractures in his ribcage to mend.

"Yes, I can imagine," she murmured before she edged back and raised the brush to swipe across his chest again. She paused before the mud-coated tip could make contact, another sudden thought springing to mind that D could see in her eyes. She craned her neck to peer over her shoulder, casting a look at the suit of dark armor that was lying on the far end of the shelf where D's equipment had been gathered together. "That reminds me," she said in an uneasy tone as she turned back to him, her pale yellow eyes filled with both concern and mild curiosity. "That armor you were wearing... what exactly is it made from? The plating, not the weave holding it together," she amended. "I've never seen anything like it, and believe me when I say I've run across some very exotic metal amalgams before."

D cast a glance towards his armor, wondering how best to answer her. It would have been a lie to say he didn't know, as he once needed to have part of it replaced after exposure to a truly vile acid. Fortunately it hadn't been an overly vital component and so he had continued to use the damaged armor until he had been fortunate enough to encounter a metalsmith who was able to identify the proper mix of metals and recast the ruined plates. However, he wasn't sure he wanted to impart that information to her given the fact that it was more than likely that he would have to combat her directly at some point. Whether the odds would be in his favor by then was in of itself seemingly unlikely, but he had learned that every fraction of the odds still in his favor made things just that much more likely to go the way he needed them to go.

"It was my father's," D spoke up just as her expression darkened and she started to draw in a breath to chastise him for not answering her. He had very little reason to be cooperative at this point, but he also know that he would only make his situation that much worse if he wound up antagonizing her.

"Ah," she said quietly, casting another brief glance over her shoulder at the form-fitting armor before returning her attention back to her task. "It's pretty solid, I know that much. That's probably what saved you from the same fate as your horse," she added, giving him a somewhat unsettled look as she reminded herself of the distinctly gory scene.

He cast the briefest of glances over at her before closing his eyes and trying to shut out the outside world. The mud was starting to have an effect on his arm where it was starting to dry out, easing the burning feeling of his sun-seared skin and starting to restore vitality to the muscle tissue beneath. He doubted the minor recuperative effects would do much in of itself, but he had to remind himself that even the tiny amounts of elemental life-energy that he could absorb from the earthen mixture was still a lot better than having to keep using his own dwindling supply of energy to heal the damage.

The faintest of growls rose up from his chest as she resumed smearing the warm mud across his body. He knew that his energy reserves were dangerously low at this point and the prospects for recovering that energy were not overly encouraging. He wasn't truly at the danger point yet, the point where neither his willpower nor the strength of his human side could keep his vampiric nature fully contained, but he was also painfully aware of just how thin the margin was right now. He had both heard the stories and seen the after-effects of a vampire gone mad from blood-hunger, the once-keen intellect reduced to a mere spark of bestial hunger that lashed out at everything and everyone around it in search for that life-sustaining blood.

The slightest of tickling feelings caused his stomach to twitch slightly, refocusing his mind on his current situation. Coral had already painted the entirety of his chest and was working on his lower abdomen, a look of amusement forming on her face as she realized that he had reacted to having his navel accidentally tickled by the brush.

"Just a little ticklish, are we?" she purred in a coy tone as she brushed around his navel again, resulting in another subtle but still visible twitching of his abdominal muscles. "It's okay, D, I'm ticklish too. In fact, if you came at me with a pair of feathers and knew how to use then, I'd probably be helpless and very much at your mercy. You would be gentle with me, I trust?" she added as she looked up at him with a twinkle in her eyes.

"Maybe," he replied in a hollow tone, narrowing his eyes slightly as he dearly hoped she wasn't slipping into a playful mood. He could handle combat, he could handle vampires and werewolves and all the horrors of the night that were associated with such entities, but he still found it quite unsettling to try to deal with a woman who was in a playful mood. Especially one who was dressed in just her underwear and had him in a most untenable situation, or at least untenable from his perspective...

"Maybe," she mocked softly with a knowing smirk on her face as she resumed coating him in mud. "Come now, D, why so vague about your intentions? I've heard the whispered stories about you and your oh-so-gentle touch when you let a woman take you to bed. I even spent a few years researching them, just to make sure," she added, giving him a faintly chilling smile as she noticed the look of sudden unease that crossed his face before he could mask it. "And not once did any of your... companions describe it as anything other than gentle and tender."

It took D a moderate amount of effort not to sigh or give any outward indication that his blood temperature felt like it had just dropped by a good thirty degrees or so in the span of a few seconds. It had started when he had accepted a contract from the Elbourne family after Charlotte was kidnapped by the vampire Meier Link, a payment of twenty million if he could either bring her back to them alive and unchanged by vampirism or peacefully put her soul to rest if she had been transformed. He hadn't been the only vampire-hunter hired for the job, however, and soon he came into contact with Leila and the Markus brothers.

In the end, only he and Leila survived to explain the story to others. Charlotte had not been the damsel in distress as everyone had feared but had fallen in love with Meier and willingly went with him to try to reach Castle Chaythe, the home of the legendary vampiress Carmilla. The plan was for them to use her shuttle to reach the City of the Night, a massive space-station that hovered high over the planet where their love for one another could be allowed to play out without interference from others. Carmilla, however, had other plans and had preyed on their hopes in order to try to reanimate her physical body and return to corporeal existence to once again terrorize humanity. The Markus brothers had fallen one by one to various traps and ambushes along the way and Charlotte had died in Meier's arms after being taken by Carmilla's evil hunger for blood.

D had allowed Meier to live, watching impassionately from a distance as the vampire took Charlotte's body up with him to the shuttle and from there fulfilled their dreams of leaving the planet together. It had been a deeply bitter experience, more so for Leila than him, and it had haunted them both as they tried to make their way to a town where they would part ways. At least that had been the idea until Leila passed out from exhaustion in his arms just as a sandstorm approached, forcing him to seek shelter.

Being confined together in extremely close quarters for two days ended up changing them both for the better. Leila was finally able to extinguish the dark fires of vengeance in her human heart, and it was with her help that he was finally able to realize what it was to truly be human, to open his heart to another and have his soul touched in return. She had needed to seduce him to finally make the full connection and the memories of the encounter were one of the few that he continued to treasure to this day.

Near the end as they held one another she had asked him to make a promise to give other women the same chance that he had given her, to open up to them and not refuse their willing offers of blood or the pleasure of their bodies. Leila then went on to explain about human needs for comfort and reassurance after going through truly dark times, such as the ordeal they had gone through with Meier Link and Carmilla, and how she felt that he would be learning more about his own humanity even as he helped others by reaching out to them. At the time he hadn't truly grasped the significance of the promise but made it nonetheless, seeming to bring her still-wounded human spirit a great amount of comfort and solace.

"It's part of being human, D," she had explained in a soft voice as she held him. "It helps comfort us in a time of need. It reminds us that we're alive, that we haven't lost our hold on our humanity like so many of those creatures out there. We know we have needs they don't, needs they can never have. The need to touch and be touched, to hold and be held, to love and be loved. A need to make love, to take and be taken," she added softly as she reached out to him once more...

Many years and several encounters later, however, he was all but ready to smash his skull against the nearest solid object whenever he thought about it. Not that he disliked winding up in bed every so often with a woman he had just freed from a vampire's clutches, but rather it was the social implications that was driving him up the proverbial wall. Word had circulated for centuries of how he had never expressed an interest in women like that, even in situations when it was made bluntly obvious as to what they wanted from him. Not even a month after the first night he had to fulfill his promise to Leila, however, word of the encounter had spread with almost terrifying speed across much of the landscape. By year's end, literally every human village and town he came across was aware of the change in his demeanor, attracting more than a little casual interest from a number of women who were curious about him.

He could handle being viewed with open suspicion because of his dunpeal heritage, he could deal with the sometimes hateful comments of humans who were intimidated by his silent and seemingly uncaring demeanor, and he could easily cope with the truly vicious actions of some other vampire-hunters who wanted to prove themselves by 'besting' D in a contest of one kind or another. But what he still had yet to figure out in the dozens of years since he had fallen in love with Leila and made that promise to her was just how to handle the coy, sultry, playful, and sometimes openly brazen attentions of women who wanted to sleep with him just to see how accurate the gossip and rumors were. Normally that didn't bother him too much, as he simply chalked it up to the inherent unpredictableness of women as a species, but every so often a less-than-comely woman would try to cozy up to him and make a suggestive comment that would sour his stomach at the mere thought of having to share a bed with her...

His mind suddenly disconnected itself from the rest of his body for the briefest of instants, akin to a phonograph needle skipping over a scratch in a vinyl record as it spun past. That prompted a mental blink as he tried to refocus on his surroundings and figure out what had just happened. He quickly realized that the momentary disconnect had been caused by the sensation of the mud-coated brush sliding across his manhood, ostensibly to continue to coat his body with the slightly-revitalizing earthen mixture.

"I see that got your attention," Coral purred with a faint smile as she continued to paint his anatomy, glancing up at him with a fairly wicked twinkle in her eyes. "You looked like you were zoned out on me for a few moments, and I was starting to worry that you were going to pass out or something. I don't suppose you'll tell me what's on your mind?"

He simply closed his eyes, not wanting to converse with her unless he had to. Her demeanor continued to bother him the more he thought about it, knowing that she was up to something but neither knowing nor truly wanting to know what exactly it was. He knew he would find out sooner or later, but for once he found himself wishing that it would be later instead of sooner.

His eyes snapped back open as she reached out to grab his testicles in a gentle but firm grip, sending up all sorts of warning flags in his mind. He doubted that she would actually injure him, but the gesture still sent a primal shiver of uncertainty and perhaps even fear down his spine. One of the other things he had learned from his encounter with Leila was that when a woman had you by the genitals, even when it was with a warm or inviting touch, it was definitely not the time to argue with her over anything.

"D?" Coral said in a somewhat flat tone, her lips compressed into a thin line of unamusement. "You are irritating me now with that silence of yours. As I said, I have no wish to hurt you, but let's get something understood right now. If I ask you a question, hunter? I expect an answer from you. Are we clear on that?" she inquired in a neutral tone, giving him a gentle squeeze in an unmistakable gesture of warning.

"If you insist," D replied in an empty monotone.

"Oh, I do, believe me," Coral purred softly as she very gently massaged the sac of flesh. "You'll find that things go... much more smoothly if you respond to me when I talk to you. Pearl, too, though I doubt she will be of a mind to ask as nicely for a response as I am. Manners, you know," she added as she gave him a final squeeze before letting go and taking a single step back to resume her work.

D was more than a little grateful when she fell silent after that, her gaze becoming slightly unfocused and distant again as she started to coat his thighs with the hydrated mud. He wasn't sure what she was thinking about all of a sudden, but it was still better than having to endure her questions about his own thoughts and what he was like.

Seeing that she didn't appear to be inclined to speak in the immediate future, he closed his eyes again and turned his focus inward, trying to assess his body's condition and response to being slowly ensconced in a veil of soil and clay-like compounds. The stinging of his sun-burnt skin was almost gone now, as were a number of aches and pains in his shoulders. The surface pain in his chest was likewise receding at a slow but measured pace as the bruising was allowed to heal. The deeper muscle-related injuries continued to throb and ache intensely, however, warning him that he was not anywhere close to being out of the proverbial woods as far as his injuries went.

In another time and place, he found himself thinking, he might have been able to enjoy the mud-bath experience. He had heard of it being done as a sort of luxury skin-treatment in some of the more better-off human townships and those communities built around thermal springs. The more he thought about it, the more intrigued he became by the possibilities. Being immersed in a pit of warm mud and later rinsing it off with a hot shower sounded far better than burying himself in a dirt-filled pit and later wading through a lake or a pond to get the worst of the trail-dust off. Of course, he rarely had time for such luxuries as there was almost always one more human down the road ahead he had to rescue before having to confront her vampire captor...

"There we go," Coral purred as she stood up and took a few steps back to study the mud-covered half of D's body. She giggled quietly to herself before looking up at him, the faintest hints of a blush tinting her cheeks. "Sorry, D, but you look absolutely wretched covered in mud like that. Still, it's the best I can do under the circumstances. Okay, time to take care of your back," she said as she walked around behind him, pausing only to scoop up another glob of mud from the urn. "How are you feeling?" she inquired before he felt the cool sensation on his upper back.

It took D a moment to decide how best to reply to her. "Weary," he said calmly, settling for a somewhat nondescript statement of truth. He was indeed more than a little exhausted and worn-out, but he still saw no reason to give her any sort of indication as to just how depleted his strength was.

"Anything specific, by chance?" she inquired absently as she used a series of broad strokes to paint his skin. She paused and glanced up at him as she didn't hear an audible reply, her eyebrows arching up slightly as she realized that his head was twisted to the side just enough to give her a truly dark look out of the corner of his eye. "Well?" she prodded him carefully.

"Use your imagination," D allowed himself to say, letting the faintest hint of contempt color his tone. She was hardly the first one to play games with him like this, and he found his level of tolerance to be sorely tested by her continued casual demeanor.

Coral seemed to be genuinely surprised by his response, blinking in mild disbelief before tilting her head at a slight angle to study him. "I'm not too sure about that, D, as I can imagine an awful lot," she replied in a calm and steady tone. "I don't suppose you have anything specific you'd care to say?"

He narrowed his eyes at her, suddenly getting the chilling feeling that she wasn't intentionally feigning ignorance about his pain and suffering. If that were true, then it would mean that she was either a psychopath who simply didn't care enough to notice or a mentally unbalanced individual who was quite incapable of making the proper associations between cause and effect. Or more likely one who was dangerously casual about which associations she chose to make...

"D?" she said in a low tone, a dark snarl starting to form on her face as he remained silent. "Answer me."

"What do you want from me?" D inquired, moderating his tone so that there wasn't any hint of contempt or antagonism that could be detected. He realized that if she indeed was mentally unstable, then he would have to play along with her little games until he figured out how to deal with her... and how not to accidentally step on any landmine issues that might set her off.

"I said I'll explain later," she sighed quietly, seeming to withdraw just slightly as she scooped up another brushful of mud and smeared it across his upper back. "Later tonight when I rinse the mud off of you. It needs time to set and dry out," she added absently.

They both paused and glanced towards the door as it creaked loudly to let the scantily-clad figure of Abelyne slip into the room. She quickly crossed the distance at a rapid pace, seeming to be in a haste for some reason. "Is something wrong, Abby?" Coral said in a concerned tone as she took a step back from D.

"April said the village elder is here to see you," the girl puffed as she reached out to brace one hand against the support column D was chained to. "I think he just wants a formal meeting since you've got the title of nobility. I didn't stop to ask April about the details," she added sheepishly. "She just asked me to find you while she entertains him since she's dressed and all."

"Oh, yes, I would imagine he would be keenly interested in asking what I plan on doing," Coral murmured to herself with a quiet sigh. "I completely forgot about that. Oh, well," she sighed as she tossed the brush into the urn and moved over to the half-empty basin of water. "Give me a moment to wash up and get dressed, and I'll be right up. Sorry, D, I'll have to finish up your back later," she added in what seemed to be a genuinely apologetic tone.

Abelyne risked a quick glance at D's back before turning to look at her mistress. "Coral?" she said in an uneasy tone. "If all you're doing is giving him a mud-bath, I can finish it up for you while you're dealing with Mister Largo," she offered.

The baroness promptly froze in mid-motion before glancing over at her youthful-looking slave. "Abby?" she said in a dangerously calm tone before stepping back and shaking the water from her hands. "I'm not sure that would be a good idea."

"I can handle it," Abelyne assured her as she scampered forward to scoop up Coral's dark purple dress. She quickly unfolded it and snapped it once to try to remove any trace of dust before kneeling down at Coral's feet, holding the dress open for her to step into. "I've done it for you and Pearl before, so I know how to put it on smoothly enough. That and I know you don't want it to dry out before it's evened out."

"Mmmm," Coral hummed quietly in a noncommittal tone as she stepped into the dress, lightly resting one hand on Abelyne's shoulder for support as she did so. A look of sultry delight crossed her face for a brief moment as the dress was slid up and across her skin, carefully tugged and tucked into place before the zipper was snugly closed. "Mmm, thank you, Abby," she purred as she turned to give her a soft smile before leaning over her. "You are such a good girl..."

Abelyne's eyes closed as she tilted her head back, accepting the gentle kiss from her mistress. "I'll take care of him for you," she promised in a quiet, almost dreamy tone. She yielded to a second, deeper kiss before opening her eyes once again. She carefully watched Coral's progress across the room and out the door, exhaling very quietly as the metal door was closed with a faintly ominous thump.

She seemed to shake her head violently for a moment before she turned to focus on D, absently reaching up to scratch the back of her left hand. "You're the vampire-hunter everyone was talking about earlier, aren't you?" she asked in a low tone, suddenly no longer seeming to be as innocent and carefree as she had a few moments ago. "The one who killed Baron Winters."

D regarded her carefully before parting his lips to speak. "I am," he replied in a perfectly neutral tone, wondering if this was some sort of trap or attempt at deception on Coral's part.

Abelyne slowly nodded her head in understanding. "April said she thought it was you," she said in an openly uneasy tone. "I was... busy earlier so she came down to check on you instead. I'm sorry about the sunlight," she added, almost in a whimper as if she feared his wrath. "I can't disobey Coral. I have to be a good girl for her."

"I know," D said gently, figuring that the girl was very much under the baroness' hypnotic influence.

Abelyne cast a nervous glance towards the door before she quickly padded over to the urn and picked up the brush, scooping out a large dollop of mud. "How bad are you hurt?" she asked very quietly as she started to spread the mixture across his back, picking up where Coral left off.

D hesitated for a few moments, still suspicious of the conversation and the motives behind it. Part of him doubted it was scripted, as it would mean that Coral would have to have been acting since the beginning. The paranoid part of his psyche, however, was still insisting that he couldn't trust her just yet. Maybe he would have reason to change that, but for now his sense of caution would have to take precedence over his other instincts. "Don't worry about me," he spoke up in a calm and measured tone.

The constant movement of the brush on his back seemed to pause for a few moments before resuming. "...D?" she finally spoke up, her voice little more than a frightened whisper. "I know I can't help you, but April might be able to since Coral doesn't... love her," she said after a noticeable pause.

D twisted his head slightly, just enough to bring her into the very edge of his peripheral vision. He really didn't want to look at her directly given her state of undress, but he still wanted to keep a relative eye on her for the moment. "What do you mean?" he prodded, hoping he had misunderstood her words.

A slight frown tugged on his lips as the brush on his back started to tremble before it was brought under control. "Coral loves me," Abelyne said, her voice still unsteady and almost inaudibly soft. "She often lets me hold her when we sleep. She kisses me when I ask her to, but she hasn't kissed April yet and won't let Pearl kiss her either. I can't disobey Coral and I can't help you, but April might be able to."

D closed his eyes for a brief moment and tried not to either snarl or shudder with revulsion. It was obvious that she was very much under Coral's charm, perhaps not so much her hypnotic powers but simply the innately powerful charisma that most vampires had. It was that kind of 'natural' charm that made it all too easy to bind humans to their will, wooing them as one would another he wished to possess as a lover. Thus blinded, their victims came to believe that they did love their captors, willingly offering themselves in every way conceivable in order to please them. Rescuing humans who had fallen under such an enchantment was always the hardest on him, having to first endure their rage at having their 'beloved' taken from them, then trying to soothe the grief and horror of realization once they were able to come to their senses. However, he could remember where more than one human was beyond hope of recovery, little more than empty shells of broken spirits who continued to breathe but no longer experienced any true life or emotions in the ruined husks that was all that remained of them and their humanity.

"You shouldn't worry about it," D spoke up in as gentle a tone as he could manage. "The business I have with Coral and Pearl isn't a danger to either you or your friend. You should stay back and not get involved in it."

"I'm not worried about myself," Abelyne replied softly as she continued to paint lower. "April... isn't happy here. I know I shouldn't say such things as Coral won't like it, but... can... can you find a way to take April with you when you leave here?" she suddenly blurted out, her quiet words spilling forth in a torrent that was almost incomprehensible. "I know Coral loves me, but I'm worried what will happen to April if Coral doesn't love her too..."

"Don't worry," D said calmly, the lingering doubts in his mind suddenly evaporating like so much fog beneath the sun. "I'll look into it when I can."

It seemed like an inane thing to be saying, calmly discussing the rescue of a young girl from a pair of dunpeals while he was currently stark-naked and not too far removed from death's doorstep while he lay bound in a dungeon by literally unbreakable metal chains. It was still something he felt he had to do, however, compelled by honor to try to reassure an obviously frightened and enslaved young girl. Yet another innocent at the mercy of a vampire...

The image of the carriage exploding in front of him suddenly returned to his mind, turning the pit of his stomach into an icy void. He had tried to save them too, only to watch in horror as they were mercilessly slaughtered almost literally in his face. He would have gone first to lead them out had he not been uneasy with his knowledge of the precise boundaries of the minefield. Letting Celene go ahead of him had not sat well with him at first, but he felt that he could trust her knowledge of the terrain. Indeed, she had very much justified his decision to trust her after skillfully navigating the minefield without incident, but he wondered just how different the scenario would have been had he been in the lead instead of following the carriage when they made their approach to the supposedly abandoned archway that none of them said they could ever remember being used or manned...

Enough, he told himself as he closed his eyes. There was nothing he could do about the carriage and its passengers now. Perhaps others might have found a measure of peace and comfort in the knowledge that they most likely didn't suffer and that they died as free men and women instead of slaves of a despotic tyrant like Simon Winters. All that was left for him to do was continue his seemingly endless work of trying to bring an end to the menace his kind posed to the innocents of the world. His kind...

We are bound in blood, you and I, a voice rose up from the dark depths of his mind, taking on the slender and distinctly cold beauty of a countess he had killed some time ago. How can you betray your own kind like this, D? Yes, my flesh and yours are not of the same lineage, but we are both kin in blood! You claim we are the ones who are blinded and uncaring, but what do you see in the mirror when you look at yourself? Does the kiss of the sun not burn you? Are your teeth not sharp? Is your thirst not for the blood of others? How can you justify slaughtering your brothers and sisters like this, D? HOW?

He was spared the ordeal of having to answer the ghosts of his past by the unmistakable feeling of another instantaneous sensory disconnect, almost as if his mind had stopped to hiccup for a brief moment. It took a moment to realize that it was caused by another tickling feeling from the brush, only this time it was inside his thighs and dangerously high up.

Abelyne froze in mid-motion as D turned his head to look at her out of the corner of his eye. "I'm sorry," she apologized as her cheeks started to turn bright crimson, "But you need to be completely covered by the mud for it to work properly. Please don't be mad at me, Coral will be upset if I don't do this the right way..."

D just shook his head gently. "I was just surprised, that's all," he said quietly, turning back around to stare over at his equipment in the distance. He blinked hard as the thought sprang to mind, wondering if she had enough free-will to retrieve something for him. The idea was dismissed almost just as quickly as he realized that he didn't have anything among his gear that could possibly have any effect or impact on either tempered titanium chains or their adamantium cores.

The lockpicks? he suddenly thought as he cast a quick glance up at his wrist. His second moment of hopeful inspiration was crushed just as easily as the first when he realized that there wasn't any sort of locking mechanism that could be finessed, the bands held together by a series of bolts that appeared to require special tools to unscrew. Or at least tools tough enough to not be shattered by the torque when the titanium bolts started to resist any such force being applied.

The other sets are titanium, the symbiot's voice suddenly spoke up in his mind as he remembered its words earlier, but the ones here were replaced with carbon-tempered iron. You might be able to pop them if you had your full strength back...

"There, all done," Abelyne said as she put the brush in the urn and took a few steps back, casting a critical eye on both her handiwork and Coral's. She paused for a moment before stepping around to examine his front as well, making sure that the mud was both applied evenly and smoothed out so as not to crumble easily once it dried.

The faintest of inaudible sighs rose up from D's throat as he noticed her gaze lowering down to his midsection, resulting in a fairly moderately blush springing to her cheeks. It was not the first time a young girl had been given the chance to study his naked body, even as unintentional as was the case now, and in almost every case the result had consisted of two things: a blush of one degree or another, and a significant rise in their levels of sexual desire. The former was of no concern to him, as it was a simple and completely natural biological reaction to a number of emotions. He supposed that it should have equally applied to the latter, as it too was a natural reaction. But for all that he was wary of playful women and how dangerous they could be, he knew that the level of danger was all but dwarfed by the level posed by a playful woman who was also in an amorous mood.

She glanced up at him and the blush promptly tripled in intensity, making the sharpness of her blue eyes and the golden-yellow of her hair stand out in starker contrast. "Coral should be back soon," she managed to murmur as she turned to look towards the door, reaching up to rub her left wrist without thinking about it.

D said nothing as he closed his eyes, more out of a sense of offering her a semblance of modesty than anything. She seemed to be comfortable with her state of undress, though he couldn't be sure how much of that was the influence Coral had over her. That wasn't to suggest he wasn't appreciative of her body in a purely objective sense, as she was quite beautiful despite her dangerously youthful appearance, but there was a time and a proper place for such things and he was all too aware that he was in neither.

"Are you alright?" she suddenly spoke up, her soft voice sounding worried.

He opened his eyes to glance up at her before nodding slightly. "I am," he assured her, not wishing to worry her with his current situation. He knew he was a far cry from being 'alright' in any sense of the word, but he knew that he was very slowly edging back from the abyss of oblivion, one tiny step at a time. Already he could feel the restorative effects of the mud seeping into his energy-starved body. Granted it was not a truly significant amount, as large amounts of elemental energy like that could only be drawn from contact with the ground as a single, unified entity, but like drops of rain into a water barrel for collection every little bit did help in the long run.

Abelyne cast a quick glance towards the closed door before she hesitantly edged closer to him until she was close enough to touch him. "I'll... I'll ask April if she can find a way to come down here to talk to you herself," she said, her voice slipping into a frightened whisper as if she feared being seen or heard talking to him. "Please, D, don't worry about me, but you have to take her with you. You have to," she pleaded as she looked into his eyes, her own eyes seeming to be ready to fill with tears. "She's not happy here and I'm worried about her..."

"I'll do what I can," D said calmly, looking at her and trying to project a feeling of comfort and solidarity. On the inside, however, he was trying not to cringe at the thought of being anywhere close to a crying woman. It was bad enough that he didn't understand women's emotions when they were in a normal frame of mind and understood them even less when they were crying, but there was the added danger of the fact that tears burned his skin as if they were droplets of holy water. "You have my word of honor," he added.

His words seemed to reassure her greatly, soothing the subtle trembles in her body and letting a faint smile touch her lips. "Thank you," she murmured as she started to reach up to touch him. She froze as she heard the door start to open, quickly taking a step back and lowering her arms to her sides.

D felt a faint chill course through his blood as Coral returned, holding a slender silver goblet in her gloved hand. She seemed to be a content mood as she calmly crossed the floor to stand next to her slave, absently reaching out with her other hand to caress the back of Abelyne's neck.

"I just finished," Abelyne spoke up calmly, a somewhat hazy and dreamy look returning to her eyes. D wasn't quite sure if her shift in mood was faked or not, but he had the suspicion that it partly due to being exposed once again to Coral's innate charisma.

"Mmm, have you now?" Coral purred as she slowly walked around D to examine him from every angle. "I see that you have," she said demurely after a moment, bringing a smile to Abelyne's face that soured D's stomach. There were only two instances where he could remember seeing that kind of smile on a human's face before, and the first was right after they had injected themselves with any number of mind- and mood-altering drugs. The second, of course, was when they were dominated by a vampire and were basking in the satisfaction of having pleased their master to one degree or another.

"Very well done, my lovely," Coral murmured softly as she came back around D and moved to stand close to Abelyne, leaning down to nuzzle her cheek gently.

It took D a moderate effort not to visibly react to the tableau taking shape in front of him. The look on Abelyne's face was nothing short of bliss, tilting her head slightly so that Coral's lips brushed her cheek further back towards her ear. A hand reached up to very lightly caress Coral's neck with an almost feathery touch, very gently guiding her lips down to the side of her throat where the scars were.

Coral kissed her throat tenderly before lifting her head up, twisting her neck just enough to glance over at D. A truly chilling smile formed on her lips as she noticed D's obvious unease with the scene. She then deliberately moved around to stand behind her slave, still leaning over to let her lips roam up and down the faintly pulsing expanse of Abelyne's bared throat.

"Coral?" Abelyne whispered very softly, still caressing the side of her mistress' head in an unmistakable gesture of gentle urging. Her other hand slid up to brush against her bare breast, gliding a single fingertip around the dark circle of her areola in a deliberate motion.

Coral raised an eyebrow as she saw D's face darken considerably, almost as if he was daring her to take the young girl on the spot. The faintest of dark smiles brushed her lips as she allowed her vampiric nature to assert itself, elongating her vampiric fangs and infusing her corneas with a soft golden glow. A simple tilt of her chin brought the points of her fangs into contact with the girl's throat, very lightly raking across the skin without breaking either the soft flesh or eye-contact with D.

Only those with a vampire's super-sensitive hearing could detect the very soft and subtle creaking of the chains as D became tense, his hands curled into tight fists as he began to unconsciously strain against the titanium bonds that imprisoned him. The faintest of blue glows became discernible in his eyes as his vampiric half started to assert itself, barely held in check by his will.

"Coral?" Abelyne whispered again, her nipples visibly tightened from the excitement and anticipation. Her fingertip ceased the slow swirling motion and moved up slightly higher up, gently rolling and pinching the hard and throbbing nub between her thumb and forefinger.

The baroness chuckled very softly to herself as she leaned closer to her slave, letting the softness of her lips brush across the girl's throat. "Not now, my sweet," she said in a very quiet tone. "I still have things I need to do, and we both know business has to come before pleasure. But later tonight, I promise you," she added as she moved up to kiss her ear, her ungloved hand sliding around to gently squeeze both Abelyne's fingers and the nipple captured between them.

The attention seemed to send a shudder through the young girl, almost as if in a gentle orgasm. "Please?" she whimpered, her lips tugging down in an almost heart-rending look of disappointment that only D could see.

Another soft chuckle rose up from Coral's throat as she leaned back, her hand leaving Abelyne's breast to touch her chin. "Later, my sweet," she purred as she tilted her chin so that their eyes could meet. "Just think of the wait as adding the sweetness of anticipation. You did a wonderful job with the mud-bath which saved me a bit of work, so don't think I'm not grateful. I'll make it up to you later tonight," she purred in a honeyed tone as she leaned forward once again. "I promise..."

Perhaps Coral might have been able to hear the soft snarl of contempt and anger that rose up from D's throat, but it was most likely drowned out by the volume of the hum of pure pleasure Abelyne made as Coral kissed her, a deep melding of their lips that seemed to take both women's breath away. D found the sight to be almost physically nauseating, not because it was two women who were kissing but because he knew that Coral was taking full and open advantage of the young girl.

"Go on," Coral murmured softly as she edged back and stood up straight, her gloved hand still carefully holding the silver goblet well away from their bodies. "The sooner I take care of this means the sooner I can come see you again, my sweet..."

"Okay," Abelyne replied, giving her a dreamy smile before she turned and left the room, seeming to shiver slightly for no apparent reason. D watched her carefully as she left, able to catch the way she started to rub her left hand just as she left the room. The door was gently closed behind her a moment later, the soft metallic sound seeming to echo unusually loud in the room.

"Like I said," Coral said in a somewhat sultry voice as she took a few steps closer to D, "Good girls like her are so hard to find these days. I take it you're like my sister and don't approve of such tender things?" she inquired lightly, gently swirling the contents of the goblet around.

"I don't think your sister and I have anything in common," D managed to reply without snarling or baring his fangs. The faint blue glow in his eyes faded a moment later as he got a firmer control on his darker half. "And no, I don't approve of anyone preying on innocent young girls, even under the false guise of tenderness or love."

Coral seemed to wince slightly at the rebuke. "Oh, such harsh words," she sighed, apparently genuinely disturbed by his comment. "I've taken good care of Abby since she came into my possession."

"Humans are not possessions," D stated, giving her a flat look.

"Odd, they've been ruled by the nobility since longer than any of us can remember," she pointed out, making a gesture with her goblet. "And I'll bet it was that way long before you were born or even an idea. Just how old are you, anyway?" she inquired absently as she took a careful sip from the goblet.

D narrowed his eyes even further before replying. "I don't remember."

"Come now, D," she chided him, giving him a faintly disappointed look.

D simply shook his head, knowing that he was telling the absolute truth. He had long ago lost track of the ancient calendar used to record his birth, the days and years and even centuries having slipped past him in the interim largely without notice. His present awareness of time consisted only of the turning of the seasons, adjusting his equipment and supplies based on what the weather patterns were likely to be in the months ahead.

"That's sad," Coral observed with a faint sigh. "I'd almost go so far as to say depressing as well. Okay, so maybe I'd be just as depressed to see the years rack up after the second or third century, but still... you can't know where you're going to go in the future if you don't know where you've been in the past. Or when," she added lightly.

D knew that the wisdom in her words was quite correct, and had he not come to believe his future lie only in the embrace of oblivion he might have kept a better eye on where he had been so he could look forward to where he otherwise might be going. It was, he reflected a moment later, probably the reason he had given up trying to reconcile the old calendar to the one most humans used these days. If neither the future nor the past mattered, what use was it to waste the energy being concerned with keeping abreast of what arbitrary point in time you were at between the beginning and the ultimate end?

"In any case," Coral said conversationally as she edged closer to him, "Abby was right about the village idiot simply wanting to say hi now that I'm the one who rules the region. He said the crop fields were a little shaken up from the collapse of the castle and that everything was now... how did he put it?" she mused as she briefly stared off into empty space. "Dustier than his wife's sense of humor, or something to that effect. I'll have to admit I had a bit on my mind and wasn't paying close attention to the rambling old fool, but he did give me a nice bottle of wine as a gift. Care for a taste?" she added as she held the silver goblet up to his lips.

D cast a wary glance down at the amethyst fluid as it rippled slightly in the goblet. A very subtle sniff indicated that it was a rather fragrant wine and didn't appear to be tainted with anything. He figured that it was safe to drink after noticing her sip it earlier, but the hair on the back of his neck was still at rigid attention.

"I'll pass," D said calmly as he glanced up at her.

"D, don't be such a sourpuss," Coral admonished him gently as she drew the goblet back. She glanced down and gently swirled the wine around before taking a measured sip. "Mmm. It's probably no more than three years old, but it has the most wonderful aftertaste to it. Try it," she urged softly as she brought the goblet up to his lips again.

Several moments passed in silence as D kept his gaze on her, not making any motion to accept. The edges of her lips started to tug down slightly as the silence went on, her mood slowly darkening at his continued resistance.

"D?" she finally said calmly with a faint undercurrent of disappointment to her tone. "What's the problem? You do drink wine, don't you?"

"I'm naked and chained down in a dark dungeon," D said in a matter-of-fact tone that was both empty of emotion and flatter than the surface of an anvil. "I'm not inclined to do you any favors or otherwise play games at the moment."

A soft sigh rose up from Coral's chest as she took a step back, absently taking another sip of the wine. "It's not like I have a choice, you know," she pointed out, not seeming to be apologetic in the slightest. "Pearl likes to play to a captive audience when she shows off her skills with weapons, and I'm pretty sure turning you loose without the proper restraints on your activities would be unhealthy for both her and I. You do want to kill me now that I'm the Baroness, correct?" she prodded carefully.

"Unless you change your ways, it may come to that," D said as he tried not to fantasize too hard about being able to run her through with his sword right now. He knew that he would indeed have to kill her at some point in the near future, especially if she seemed ready to continue her father's cruel ways.

"I'm not sure what you mean by that," Coral admitted with another casual sip of the wine, "But I'm still getting the feeling that you don't like me for some reason. And believe me when I say everyone knows what happens to nobles whom you don't like," she added in a faint tone of both warning and unease.

D raised an eyebrow in dry and remote amusement at her words. "It's hard to like someone who uses children as slaves and abuses others for pleasure or amusement," he pointed out in a flat tone. "Many would call that evil."

"Oh, not this argument again," Coral sighed in open resignation. "D, you know as well as I do that things like 'evil' and 'good' are both very relative exercises in judgment. Some of us think what you do is evil, hunting down and killing your own kind in a one-dunpeal attempt at genocide, but I'm sure you believe that what you're doing is good, right?"

"To kill without cause is evil," D countered quietly, giving her a level look. "To harm innocents is evil. Righting an ancient wrong and freeing the world from the darkness of our tainted blood, however, is not evil."

Coral's pale eyebrows arched up slightly. "Righting an ancient wrong?" she echoed, seeming to be slightly amused by the notion. "Oh, do tell."

D sighed on the inside, knowing that it would be extremely difficult to explain things to someone who hadn't studied the ancient archaeological records of what the world was like ten thousand years ago, before the rise of vampires as the dominant life-form on the planet. His father had collected a number of artifacts and relics from that era and as a child D had found them to be more than a little intriguing. They had all been destroyed when his father's palace fell during the Blood Wars but the idle fascination with them had remained with D during his adult life, pausing in his journeys for a few moments when time permitted to study an ancient ruin or historical area whenever he passed by.

"Surely you know about the red moon," D spoke up, trying to get a feel for both her historical knowledge and how much interest she had in discussion and debate. He wasn't about to waste his breath if all she wanted to do was toy with him, but she was indeed open to negotiation about his fate then what did he have to lose at this point?

She gave him a disturbing smile as she moved over to the control levers, pulling the one that opened the ceiling hatch. D cast a glance upwards as it opened, blinking in surprise as the mirrored surface of the tunnel was promptly flooded with a dull crimson light.

"The red moon," Coral said with open amusement. "Yes, I think I've seen it before. A big red thing in the sky, right? Larger than the big white thing in the sky? Is this what you're talking about?" she added with a gesture of her goblet to the distorted reflection visible halfway up the tunnel.

D gave her a classic 'we are not amused' look before carefully drawing in a deep breath to speak. "Ten thousand years ago, the red moon didn't exist in the evening sky," he explained slowly. "It wasn't until it was summoned here from another world that it began to influence the humans, corrupting a number of them into mutants and allowing vampires to emerge from the shadows."

"Oh?" Coral said, turning to give him a surprised look. "How interesting. I'll admit my knowledge of history probably pales in comparison to yours, but what you've lived through would mostly qualify as ancient history in my book," she observed with a chuckle and a twinkle of amusement in her pale yellow eyes. "Go on," she added as she tilted her head at a slight angle.

"The world was reshaped, but not just because of the new moon's gravity," D continued in a weary tone. "The vampires quickly dominated the planet and enslaved the human survivors, thus beginning ten thousands years of pain and unjust suffering. The summoning of the moon was no accident, and thus neither was the aftermath of evil that covered the world in darkness that continues to this day. That was the injustice, the ancient wrong."

"Ahh," she replied with a slow nod, a faint hint of a smile touching her lips. "So you simply seek to undo what is done, then? Turn back the clock by ten thousand years and destroy all that our kind has accomplished since the beginning? Bring an entire race to oblivion," she said slowly as she advanced on him, one measured step at a time. "And that will... what, bring back the ancient humans? Undo their so-called pain and misery?"

D narrowed his eyes dangerously at her as she stopped in front of him, barely less than a foot away. "What is done, is done," he said in a low tone, unconsciously straining at the chains. "I can't undo the deeds of the past, but I can try to make sure the evil of the past remains there. This world has suffered beneath the yoke of vampires long enough, it needs to be freed once and for all."

"Evil of the past," she purred very softly, taking another sip of wine. "How quaint. Tell me, hunter, did my father have anything to do with this... summoning of the moon? Was he responsible for the reshaping of the world or this veil of darkness you believe we are all living under?"

"Of the moon, no," D replied calmly. "But he spread his own darkness to those he enslaved and murdered. How many innocents suffered and died because of him, either by his own hand or by those who followed him? How many others have likewise suffered and died because of those just like him, drained of blood to slake the hunger of vampires and cast aside like so much garbage when they were of no further use?"

"Countless, I would imagine," Coral replied with a shrug of indifference. "However, that seems to be the natural order of things in life, the proverbial food-chain. Surely you know what I'm talking of, the predator and the prey. It is as old as life itself, the strong shall live and the weak shall die. I see that philosophy bothers you," she added as she saw D's lip curl back before he could control the dark emotions raging inside him.

"That works for animals," D spat back, almost literally spitting as he continued to reign in his temper. "It works for those who are innocent, who don't know any better and don't have the capacity to comprehend concepts beyond hunger and thirst. But humans are not animals, they are every bit as sentient and intelligent as vampires imagine themselves to be."

A faint chuckle rose up as Coral regarded him carefully. "You might want to rethink that last one," she pointed out in an openly amused tone. "Oh, I've met some fiendishly smart humans before, trust me, but the majority I've met are about as intelligent as a rock in a box. It often makes me wonder how they managed to exist before we came along, but that's a topic for debate at a later time. I'm sorry, D, but I guess we won't be seeing eye-to-eye on this one for quite some time," she apologized with a shrug and another sip of her wine.

"However," she added as she raised the goblet to peer over the rim at him, "That doesn't mean we can't behave like civilized people and simply agree to disagree. You are, after all, as noble as I am in spite of our births to human mothers. Not that I'm saying having human blood is a bad thing," she allowed as she lowered the goblet and held up her ungloved hand, studying it carefully. "After all, that is what allows us to exist in the sun without turning into a pile of ash after a minute of casual exposure. Which is good, as I happen to like watching sunrises. It's quite pretty the way it turns the sky all pink and orange like that, don't you agree?"

"Maybe," D said quietly, suddenly aware of a change in his condition. The reflected light of the red moon continued to shine down him, focused by the way the surface mirrors were set and concentrating the resulting lunar radiance on his mud-covered body. Perhaps it was just his imagination, but it felt like he was starting to heal faster on the inside now that he was being bathed in the blood-colored light. "But I'm not exactly a morning person," he added quickly, deciding it might be best if he were to stall her so that he could spend more time in the moonlight.

"Oh, the irony," Coral murmured as she shook her head slightly. "Imagine that, a dunpeal who isn't a morning person. Not that either I or my sister are morning people either," she admitted lightly with a soft smile, "But it's still the thought that counts. How's the mud?"

"Drying out," D said, casting a glance at his arms. "It should fully cure in another hour or two."

"Mmm," she hummed absently as she took another sip of wine. "I had hoped it would dry faster. Oh, well, no matter, I'll peel it off of you once it sets properly. You know, D," she said in a faintly hesitant tone, prompting a wary look from him, "Scarecrow look aside, you really don't look too bad like that. I'm almost tempted to ask to borrow the lithograph from the village. Oh, I'm just teasing you," she sighed as she caught the look on his face. "Honestly, D, you need to relax a little."

It took him a considerable amount of effort not to sigh or shake his head at her casualness. "Under the present circumstances," he said in a perfectly neutral tone, "That's going to be more than a little difficult."

"Mmm," she replied softly, seeming to be more of a grunt than a hum. She took an absent sip of the wine before pausing in mid-motion, starting off into empty space to think for a moment. "D?" she said as she refocused and looked up at him. "How about if I make you a deal?"

"I'm listening," he assured her, wondering what she was thinking. He was fairly sure that she was a borderline psychopath who genuinely didn't make the connection between her actions and the sufferings of others. Part of him still thought that it was deliberate callousness on her part, either because of her upbringing or her own dark tendencies, but in any case he knew that she was far more of a danger to both him and the humans than someone like Pearl or even the late Baron Winters.

"I will unchain you and let you do as you please," Coral said in a very slow and deliberate manner, "But only if you promise me two things. First, you can't try to hurt or act against either me or my sister in any fashion. That means you can't kill us," she added in a pointed tone.

"And the second condition?" D prompted in a moderate tone, knowing that he couldn't possibly agree to her 'deal' because of the first point alone. While he might indeed be able to spare her life depending on how she treated others, there was very little hope of redemption for a twisted soul like Pearl. As long as she continued to delight and revel in the pain of others, she had no place in this world and was thus needed to be returned to the abyss of oblivion that she and her kind had come from so long ago. Her kind and his.

"Second, you can't leave here or try to escape me," she said, giving him a soft smile that chilled his blood. "Oh, I'll take you out with me whenever the mood strikes, but I can't have you just blithely running off or otherwise left to your own devices and machinations. You'd be a safety hazard," she added in a stage whisper, her eyes twinkling with impish amusement.

"You don't ask much, do you?" D observed dryly, prompting a very quiet giggle from the other dunpeal that failed to amuse him in the slightest.

She shrugged and crossed her arms, absently swirling around the last bit of wine in her goblet. "Try to consider it from my point of view," she replied with casual indifference. "If I let you loose without those two promises, you will probably try to kill me before hunting down Pearl as well. And even if you don't, you'll still leave here to keep killing our kind. I'm afraid I just can't let that happen, D," she added with a sigh that almost seemed regretful.

"What makes you think I won't do that even if I promise you?" he prodded quietly. He was fairly sure by now that the concentrated light from the red moon was indeed helping him recover. He wasn't sure why it was doing so, but he figured that he would have ample time later to try to come up with some sort of answer that was both plausible and easily tested.

"You will," Coral purred in a honeyed tone, giving him a sultry smile as she approached close to him. "I know you, D, and I know about your reputation. A man of unshakable honor, many have said. Not once in my research did I ever hear even the slightest hint of a rumor that you ever broke a promise made in good faith. I know you'll keep your word if you give it to me in this case," she breathed, leaning over to let her lips brush against his ear. "I know I would be putting not just my life at stake by trusting you like that, but my sister's as well. And you know what, D? I do trust your word that much."

"I'm flattered," D said in a hollow tone devoid of any emotion.

"Mmmm, I'll bet you are," she murmured huskily. She paused for a moment before edging back, giving him a curious look before craning her head to look up at the crimson-tinted tunnel above them. "Oooh, that feels weird. Do you feel anything, D?" she inquired, giving him a faintly concerned look.

"I'm not sure," D replied in a measured tone. "It's hard to feel much in this sort of situation."

"We can solve that, you know," she prodded him gently, reaching out with her ungloved hand to tilt his chin back slightly. "All I'm asking you is to promise me you won't hurt me or Pearl, and that you won't try to leave me."

"I'll think about it," D said calmly, giving her a look that was extremely difficult for her to read or interpret.

She sighed heavily to herself in open resignation, her breath brushing his cheek in a gentle exodus of warm air. "Very well, D, I'll let you think about it. I don't see why you would need to, however, as I really am not asking very much of you at all. Or am I that abhorrent to you that you wish only to kill me and be done with it?" she prodded in a slightly uncertain tone, as if she wasn't sure she wanted to hear the answer.

"Let's just say that actions speak louder than words," D spoke up calmly. "Evil is as evil does. Should you continue to do evil, then I will indeed seek to strike you down like all the others."

"I see," Coral replied very quietly in a subdued tone. "I don't suppose there's anything I can do to change your mind?"

"There is," D said as he gave her a piercing look. "Simply do no evil."

"I see we're back to the discussion about what constitutes evil," she said in a neutral tone as she stepped away from him. "Apparently we're going to have to sit down together at some point and iron it out between us until we're both on in agreement about what truly defines 'evil' in this world."

D said nothing as he closed his eyes and exhaled softly, not wanting to continue the discussion. He had lived his entire life with the understanding of what the differences were between good and evil, and he strongly doubted that she would have anything to say that was either new to him or was valid enough to make him sit back and re-examine his own values.

"Very well, hunter," she said in a faintly cool tone, "We shall speak of this another time then. I shall return once the mud has set," she said as she moved past him.

The sound of her footsteps remained awfully close, prompting D to open his eyes and glance over to where she was moving. "Coral," he spoke up quickly as he saw her reaching for the lever that would close the ceiling hatch.

"Mmm?" she inquired with a faint hum as she glanced over at him, one hand resting on the lever.

"Would you leave that open for me?" he said gently after a brief pause to decide how best to phrase things. He was about to say more when she jerked on the lever, closing the hatch and cutting off the glow of the red moon.

"Make those promises to me first, D," she said in a faintly edged tone as she turned away from him and headed for the door. "Then we can talk about what kind of... favors I can do for you."

D said nothing as she left the room. As he expected, the door made a soft creaking noise as it shut, followed by a loud click as the locking mechanism was engaged from the other side. Sighing quietly, he turned his focus inward and closed his eyes, acutely aware of the subtle emphasis she had put on the word 'favors' moments ago.

((D?)) it spoke up after the room was deathly silent for a few moments.

"You must stay quiet," D murmured softly. "The room may be monitored."

((It's a dungeon, D,)) it scoffed quietly. ((Besides, I checked earlier and I'm not sensing any sort of electrical devices anywhere around here. Look, I don't know if you've started to pick up on this, but I'm pretty sure that your lovely captor is, shall we say, missing a few buttons. And I'm not talking about yesterday's blouse, either,)) it added dryly. ((Damn, those were some nice breasts out on display when she decked you. Not that you would have noticed or anything, but still. I wouldn't mind giving those beauties a taste-test...))

"Quiet," D growled, more out of a simple reflex than actual irritation.

((Just listen for a few, okay?)) it sighed. ((Maybe I'm missing something, but Coral doesn't sound like she's playing with a full deck. Either that or her blood is cold enough to make a snake's blood in the dead of winter seem to be warm in comparison. Pearl's just evil to the core, but Coral has some very serious issues. If I were you, D, I'd worry more about her than her sister.))

A very quiet grunt of agreement rose up from D's throat, knowing that if the thing in his hand had picked up on it as well then it wasn't just his own perception and judgment reaching that conclusion.

((Also, in case you hadn't noticed, she's working that hypnosis power of hers pretty hard,)) it continued, causing D to open his eyes and glance up at his hand. His left hand, he suddenly realized with a hard blink.

"How so?" he inquired carefully.

((That's... a good question,)) it admitted. ((I'm not quite sure what it is or how it works, but my nerves have been going haywire whenever she uses that voice. You know, the slinky, sexy, come hither and I'll please you if you'll please me first tone. It's hard to miss, really. Well, maybe you could miss it as you tend to ignore women who try to cuddle up...))

"Enough," he muttered. "I know what you mean. Can you counteract it?"

((Er, in case you hadn't noticed,)) it replied in a somewhat tart tone, ((Her wily wills have been affecting me and not you. Notice that your hand isn't itching like everyone else's when she gets all lovey-dovey?))

"How bad is it?" he inquired, suddenly leery at the prospect of having the symbiot fall under her sway and start working against him.

((Hah, please,)) it chuckled quietly. ((Believe me when I say that you'll be putty in her hands from normal feminine charms long before she'll be able to dominate me with her will. After all, you've never been able to do so, right? And don't tell me you've never tried before, either,)) it admonished him.

"Let me know if you encounter any difficulty resisting her," D instructed as he closed his eyes again. "I'll see if I can change her focus. As I said, you need to stay silent and undetected until I need you."

((Yeah, yeah,)) it sighed quietly. ((So I take it you're going to try to do something about April and Abelyne, then? April was down here earlier when you were five-sixths unconscious, by the way, and she didn't appear to be under Coral's dominion. Or at least not as bad as Abby is, poor thing. She's cute as hell, though, you have to admit. Oh, for a taste of such sweetness...))

D ignored it as it prattled on quietly to itself, no doubt trying to cheer him up with the reminder of its presence. Not that it wasn't working, as D was extremely grateful it was with him. The commentary could be dispensed with, but for once in quite awhile D was more than willing to put up with it so long as it didn't reveal itself to anyone else. He could handle being tortured, or at least up to a certain degree, but the thought of being unable to protect it should it be discovered galled him far more than the thought of Coral feeding on the crimson nectar in Abelyne's veins. For all that it annoyed him on an almost constant basis, the symbiot was more than just a powerful and useful ally. It was quite literally a part of him now, and one that he would just as soon not have taken from him.

A muted grumble rose up from his chest as he thought of Abelyne and Coral. The girl was clearly enchanted by her mistress' vampiric aura, as nobody in their right mind would willingly seek to have their blood taken from them like that, or at least not with such excitement and fervor. A number of women had eagerly offered him their blood in the past, mostly as thanks for saving them and sometimes even out of genuine curiosity, but to a woman they had all been wary of the pain that would result of his acceptance. And with good reason, as a majority had confessed afterwards that they wouldn't have done so had they known just how bad it would hurt.

The dark memories surged up from the depths of his mind without warning. The pain in Doris' blood as he fed from her, the first time he had ever dared to take blood from a human before. She had cried out when he pierced her but tried to keep the noise to herself, the pain audible only as the softest of sounds that D's sensitive ears had almost missed.

Leila had likewise cried out in silence as he bit her thigh, the singing of the tension in her body serving to convey the depths of her pain every bit as effectively as a vocal cry could. The pain was likewise palatable in her blood, fading one agonizing degree at a time as he sipped the dangerously hot fluid that welled up to coat his tongue.

The other women he had yielded to had likewise reacted similarly, some remaining perfectly quiet while others cried out softly and shed tears of raw pain. One by one their faces drifted past his mind's-eye, permanently etched into his memories by the force of their human wills, their human desires, and their human souls. All had painfully sacrificed their blood for him, and yet they had all smiled and thanked him in the end, even as they wiped the last of their tears away.

So why would Abelyne be any different? the darkest part of him thought. Why couldn't she gain pleasure from letting Coral feed from her? Or use her? She may seem like a child, but she is not. What if she is one of those who finds pleasure in her own pain? Is it evil to revel in pain, even if it only your own? Where is the wrong in this if she is willing?

((D?)) the quiet voice cut through his darkened thoughts.

"What?" he murmured as the faces and voices suddenly receded back into the depths of his memory like a dark tide flowing back into the sea.

((What are you thinking about?)) it inquired in an unusually cautious tone. ((You had this god-awful look on your face a few moments ago, and quite frankly it scares the hell out of me when you get that look...))

"What kind of mud is this?" D asked calmly, not in a mood to try to share his own personal demons with it. He opened his eyes later as he felt a very odd sensation in his palm, glancing up at his wrist as he tried to figure out what to make of it.

((Mmm, mmm, good stuff,)) it hummed, causing D to grimace at the realization that it had used its tongue to scoop some of it up for analysis. ((The clay has a high salt content, but otherwise it's quite tasty. I'm not sure about how it compares to a dirt-nap, but rest assured that you've been covered in far worse mixtures of dirt before.))

Sorry I asked, D thought with a silent sigh as he closed his eyes and tried not to think about what else was going to happen tonight.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

He opened his eyes again at the sound of the lock being withdrawn, shortly followed by the now-distinctive creak of the door being opened up. He watched with only remote interest as Coral wheeled a small cart into the dungeon room. It became clear as she got close enough for him to hear that it filled with a liquid of some sort, presumably water as it gently sloshed back and forth.

An icy chill slid down D's spine as he made note of the look on her face, a distinctly pleased and almost rosy look of satisfaction. It took a moment for him to figure out the reason for his unease, able to see the faintest of traces of red around the corners of her mouth. Both the glance and the smile she gave him as she wheeled the cart next to him only added to his discomfort, knowing that few things put vampiric entities into relaxed and openly cheerful moods like a leisurely meal of fresh blood.

"So how are you feeling, D?" she purred quietly as she set the wheel brake to make sure the cart wouldn't roll away. "Is the mud helping any?"

"The sunburn should have healed by now," he said in a neutral tone.

"Oh, that's good," she replied with a warm smile. "The last thing I need is for you to come down with a case of heat exposure on me. Has it all dried out yet?" she inquired as she leaned over to examine his back.

"I haven't checked," D responded neutrally.

She paused as she finally picked up on the subtle undertone to his reply. "It's not irritating you, is it?" she inquired in a faintly worried tone. "I know some kinds of mud tend to itch and chafe when it dries, but I've never had any problems with this mixture before."

D simply closed his eyes, knowing that had been a wall in front of him he would have been sorely tempted to bang his head against it. He had dealt with his fair share of mentally-unbalanced people before, but never could he recall being forced to endure a disassociative disorder as strongly as Coral seemed to be suffering from. If you could call it suffering, he thought to himself in a rare fit of sarcasm, remembering the words an intensely chaotic but still sane young human woman had told him once a very long time ago.

I don't suffer from insanity, she had said, giving him the exact same type of predatory grin that had genuinely scared the werewolf during the stand-off less than five minutes ago. Trust me, I enjoy every second of it...

He opened his eyes again as he heard a faint rasping sound, lifting his head up just in time to watch the baroness remove a pair of scraping tools from a tiny drawer set into the opposite side of the cart. Both had flat edges on one side, but neither looked to be sharp enough to inflict injuries unless they were applied with significant force or pressure.

"Let's see what we've got," Coral purred quietly to herself as she tapped the edge of the larger tool against his bicep. The dried clay-like coating immediately fractured where it was struck but remained in place. "Oh, good, it dried all the way through," she observed as she used the smaller tool to pry a small piece of the hardened material off.

D remained silent as she promptly slipped the flat edge of the first tool into the gap, using it as a sort of wedge to edge between the mud and his skin. A simple tug broke off a fairly large chunk of dirt, falling to the floor with a muted thump to expose more of his skin.

"Yes," she cooed as she methodically started to pry the dried mud off of him, letting the fragments pile up on the tunnel cover at D's feet. "I do love this stuff. It's drawn from a river delta well to the east of here and mixed with seawater before being dumped into sealed storage containers for transport. It almost always dries out by the time it makes it this far west, but all you need to do is add a bucket or three of rainwater and it softens right up. I'm not sure what makes it so unique from other mud mixtures, but I've never seen anything else that revitalizes the skin quite like this stuff does. Both Abby and April use it as well, but not quite like Pearl and I do," she added with a soft chuckle as she continued to break the mud apart and discard it.

"Tell me about April," D impulsively spoke up, surprising them both.

Coral paused to give him a faintly uncertain look before she resumed her task of breaking the mud apart. "My darling little April," she murmured softly to herself. "I guess I shouldn't say 'little' anymore, as she's an inch taller than I am these days, but she's been with me since she was... oh, I'd say nine or ten. She's a good girl and rarely gives me any trouble. She's quite the chef, too, far better than Abelyne is. Not that Abby doesn't try," she added with a faint sigh, "But things just turn out better in April's hands. Even Pearl likes her cooking, which I assure you is saying something," she chuckled.

"So how many other slaves do you keep?" D asked in a level tone, keeping his eye on Coral's hands as she moved over to work on his other arm.

"Before or after you killed the rest in the castle?" she inquired in a faintly arched tone, casting a sidelong look at him before resuming her work.

D blinked at her tone, feeling a faint chill of unease work its way down his spine. "I'm not the one who destroyed the carriage or went out of my way to deliberately target one for assassination," he pointed out in a dark tone.

A faint huffing sound rose up from her chest. "Talk to Pearl about that, not me," she said primly. "I was busy trying to deal with you at the time. What I meant was you grabbed Celene and her rag-tag band of traitors, but what about those in the east tower? I keep Abby and April with me whenever I'm out travelling, but the rest were quartered in the east tower when I don't need their services. You didn't get them out, now did you?"

The realization hit D in the chest with the force of a mace, his breath silently leaving his lungs in a shocked exodus. He had scouted the castle as best he could, knowing he had to get everyone out before going back in to kill Baron Winters, but Celene had assured him that they were the only group. And as with the minefield, he had taken her at her word and trusted her to lead the slaves to freedom. All of them...

Enough, he told himself as he closed his eyes. He had found one of the slaves in the hallway and was quickly taken down to where Celene and the others had been imprisoned. He had been in the process of escorting them out to the courtyard stables when Baron Winters had attacked, braving the last rays of the still-setting sun to try to stop him. D had no choice but to engage the baron right then and there, yelling for the others to run for the stables while he did his best to buy them some time. The baron had pressed his attack with an intense ferocity, however, leaving D little choice but to end things as quickly as he could. The ancient castle had started to decay before the desiccated remains of the vampire had finished crumbling in on itself, forcing D to make a break for the exit while he still could...

"Why so quiet, D?" Coral said demurely as she finished his other arm and began to pry the dried mud off of his chest. "Don't tell me this is the first time the famed vampire-hunter and champion of humanity failed to save a few humans from being crushed to death by tons of rock and rubble..."

"How well does news of your failures sit with you?" D spoke up softly as he opened his eyes to look up at her.

"Mmm," she hummed absently. "I suppose you have a point. I've never been much of a graceful loser, to be honest, but I'm not as bad as Pearl. Okay, so I'm out four slaves," she sighed. "They were all cute, but I'm not going to drown my sorrows in a bottle of wine over the loss. Especially when the wine will probably cost me more than they did," she added with an absent shrug as she carefully pried a large chunk of clay off of his pectoral muscle.

It took D a few moments to quit gritting his teeth at her attitude and draw in a slow breath to respond. "Do you know what the difference is between good and evil?" he asked her in as calm of a tone as he could manage, ignoring the burning pit of anger flaring up in his chest.

She paused in mid-motion and regarded him carefully, one pale gray eyebrow arching up. "No," she finally said calmly. "Enlighten me."

"Good feels remorse over their actions, or inactions, when it results in the death or suffering of innocent people," D replied in a low tone, his eyes narrowing. "Evil does not."

"I suppose," she allowed as she resumed her work. "Although I don't see how you can think of me as evil when you're the one who killed my father and thus condemned them to death when the castle came down around them. Or does that mean your idea of freeing slaves is to free them from their lives?" she prodded carefully.

D simply looked away from her and stared at the far wall, a haunted look forming in his dark eyes. "I do the best that I can," he said in a hollow tone. "I have always accepted the consequences of my actions, both deliberate and unintentional, but I do not accept unconditional blame. If you would hang their deaths on my conscience, then know that I likewise hold you responsible for putting them in jeopardy to begin with. The difference between you and me, however," he added as he turned to look at her with a truly blistering look of fire in his eyes, "Is that I regret such things no matter whom is to blame."

Coral simply raised an eye at him. "Who's to say I don't regret it?" she countered in a mild tone as she continued to remove the mud coating. "I'm not about to let such things haunt me in my sleep, however," she added. "Things like that happen, D, and all that can be done is to try to make sure they're not repeated if it can be helped. Oh, wow," she purred a moment later, the abrupt shift in tone from brisk to somewhat sultry causing him to blink at how sudden her mood had changed. "I see the bruises are healing nicely."

D glanced down at his chest as best he could, idly making note of the fact that most of the purple-and-blue bruises had indeed faded. The flesh directly over his ribs was still visibly colored and it was easy to tell where the worst of the damage had occurred. His chest muscles, however, were still quite sore and tender, sending up small but sharp jolts of pain whenever he inhaled beyond a certain point.

"Yes," she continued to purr, setting aside the scraping tools and using her fingertips to gently pry the remaining dirt clods away from his abdomen. "You've healed quite nicely, hunter. Very, very nicely..."

A small flag went up in D's mind at the continued shifting of her tone, going from sultry to coy and husky. He still wasn't sure why she was keeping him chained as a prisoner, but he was starting to get the impression that she had a few ideas in mind that he probably wouldn't like. The fact that she was deliberately caressing him as she worked only increased his unease, as it was obvious that she was in a playful mood all of a sudden.

Enough, he told himself with a silent sigh, briefly closing his eyes as he tried to gather his courage together. If she did have something in mind, it was best that he find out about it now while he still had enough time to think and possibly even do something about it.

"Coral," he spoke up quietly, causing her to pause and glance up at him. "You promised me earlier that you would tell me what you wanted from me. I'd like to hear that explanation now, if you don't mind."

The baroness immediately froze in mid-motion, silently staring into his dark eyes before sighing quietly. "Yes, I did promise you that," she murmured as she took a step back and picked up the scraping tools again. "It's a long story, D, just to warn you," she said as she moved around behind him to resume her work.

"I'm listening," D assured her in a tone that was empty of emotion.

"I've always preferred the blood of other women," Coral said quietly as she worked. "I can't help it, it just tastes far richer than the blood of men. That's why all the slaves I've ever owned were women. Well, long before I had either April or Abelyne I had a slave named Elora. She was sixteen when she came here, a truly beautiful creature with soft brown hair and eyes like a pair of dazzling emeralds. Her blood was so rich and sweet, I'm surprised I never hurt her by savoring too much of it.

"About a good six or seven years later, I noticed a sudden change in the taste of her blood. At first I thought she had taken a drug of some sort that did something to the flavor, and believe me when I say we had a very long and serious conversation about it. As it turns out my darling little Elora had had one too many encounters with one of my father's slaves, a stable boy who was about the same age as her, and had become pregnant."

D's blood immediately turned as cold as ice at the realization. Vampires universally preferred to feast on the blood of the young, as it was full of the vitality and exuberant energy of youth. It was said among some, however, that the ultimate treat to be savored was the blood of a young pregnant woman, laden with not just her own life-energy but that of the unborn child as well. To D the thought was a physically revolting one, almost to the point of nausea, and more than one vampiric entity had likewise expressed distaste at the notion of violating a pregnant woman's veins when she was fulfilling her 'sacred role' as the bearer of future life.

"I found it to be... utterly fascinating," Coral continued, her voice softening considerably as the memories returned. "She feared my father's wrath and begged me not to let either her or her romantic interest come to harm. I have to admit I was tempted to have him killed for taking liberties with my darling little slave. After speaking with him in private shortly after the initial discovery, however, he managed to convince me of the sincerity of his feelings for her and made a very solemn oath that he would always try to be there to help care for Elora and their child.

"What followed was probably the most intriguing year of my life. I let Elora carry her child to term and studied her the entire time, curious about how such a thing went. I quit feeding from her, of course, as she needed the blood and energy for her child, but I occasionally drew small samples from a vein in her wrist to taste what it was like. D, it was amazing," she purred, pausing in her work and leaning forward to rest her cheek against a patch of skin that had been cleared of the dried mud.

D frowned and cast a sidelong look behind him at the gesture but otherwise remained motionless. "Go on," he prodded quietly.

"Her blood grew richer and richer with each month," Coral sighed as she straightened up and resumed her work. "Even those tiny samples I took, little more than thimblefuls of blood, were sweeter than honey and richer than the finest of chocolates. She began to figuratively glow from the sheer amount of life-energy contained within her, making her look all the more beautiful. I remember one time just holding her in my bed, marvelling at how her skin looked and how soft and supple it was beneath my fingertips.

"Her body changed, too, but that is expected to a degree. I have to admit that I had no true idea how large to expect her breasts to swell or her belly to grow, so measuring her from one week to the next was... oddly exciting," she confessed with a blush. "At one point I almost feared she was carrying twins, but the doctor I summoned to examine her assured me that there was only one child. When asked how she knew this, I was simply told to listen."

An icy chill slid down D's spine as she sighed longingly and pause to rest her head against his back again. "D, you can't imagine what it was like that night," she murmured quietly. "Elora was laid out in my bed and I must have spent the entire night with my head pressed to her, just listening to the very quiet but distinctive sounds within her womb. I could hear a tiny heartbeat, and when it moved I could hear her body moving with it.

"Elora went into labor right around the time the doctor expected her to, giving birth to a healthy baby girl. The process was just a little unsettling to watch, but I'm grateful to have witnessed it nonetheless. When tiny baby Jenna was first handed to her father, the stable-boy Thomas, you should have seen him break down and cry. I found it absolutely amazing at what sort of emotional impact a newborn had on others, myself included," she added in a faintly wry tone. "Even Pearl was intrigued by her, although she refused to even consider holding her or anything.

"Oddly enough, part of the glow of motherhood remained with Elora even after Jenna was born. I eventually released her from my service and persuaded Father to release Thomas as well so that they could focus on being parents. They were married shortly thereafter and allowed to move to a village not too far from here where they lived peacefully as a family. Or at least until the village was decimated by a pack of rampaging lycanthropes a few years later," she sighed quietly.

"What did you do about them?" D inquired quietly, wondering how she had reacted to news of the probably violent death of her former slave.

"About what, the werewolves?" Coral replied absently as she resumed the task of removing the dried mud from D's lower back. "Not too much, really. I made arrangements for a shipment of silver ore to be delivered to the village blacksmith and had him rework it into silver crossbow bolts for Pearl. As you can imagine, the pack was promptly exterminated during the next full moon."

D had to suppress a soft sigh of resignation at her words, knowing that it was possible for the lycanthropic disease to be purged from infected humans and that it was likely a bunch of newly-infected innocents had been slaughtered along with the original group of werewolves. He wasn't about to second-guess the situation, as he hadn't been there, but he would have laid moderate odds that Pearl hadn't bothered to even consider capturing any of them alive with the intent of seeking to cure them of their shape-changing disease once the moon had waned and the danger passed.

"In any case, the whole experience with Elora made me realize something," Coral continued quietly. "Granted it had been quite captivating to study her on an almost nightly basis since she learned she was with child, but it wasn't until I actually held little Jenna for myself that I... I found myself..."

"Wanting a child of your own," D spoke up when she trailed off, trying not to let the horror of realization show in his voice. The puzzle pieces suddenly fell into place, leaving him filled with a dark dread the likes of which he had never felt before. It was enough to turn his blood into a frozen slush that left him dangerously numb inside, fervently wishing with his entire being that he was mistaken in his conclusions of what she wanted from him.

Her fingertips slowly slid across his upper back, lightly caressing skin that had already been freed from the mud. "I see you understand," she murmured very quietly, almost too softly for him to hear.

"I don't," D replied calmly.

"I think that you do," she countered gently as her hands slid lower along his back until they encountered his buttocks. She squeezed the exposed flesh gently before starting to break apart the remaining dirt clods. "In any case, D, you're right. It took awhile for it to truly sink in, but I decided that I would like to have a child of my own. Someone I can care for and teach and love. The next question, naturally, was not so much how as whom. Whom did I wish to have a child by. It's actually a fairly important question, once you stop and think about the implications.

"Should I lay with a noble?" she continued as she stepped to the side and knelt to start working on his legs. "My child would then be more vampire than human and thus probably couldn't survive exposure to the sun. What about a human, then? I actually gave that consideration and discussed it with a human doctor only to have him point out that he hadn't heard of any such children being born to a human and a dunpeal. Or a vampire and a dunpeal, for that matter," she added with a sigh.

D blinked hard at her words, suddenly realizing that he couldn't remember having encountered any such entities himself. Noble vampires were like humans in the sense that they could bear children of their own kind, giving rise to a number of bloodlines like the noble offspring of Simon and Valentina Winters. Vampires and humans could interbreed as well, with the result being a dunpeal like himself, but apparently dunpeals couldn't interbreed with either vampires or humans.

It startled him to realize that he had never stopped to think of or even contemplate the matter. How many women had he rescued from dunpeals where they had been used as sex-slaves, and yet not a single one had ever become pregnant during their captivity? Countless women had been impregnated by vampires under identical conditions, usually against their will, but never once by a dunpeal. And the reverse was also true, female dunpeals never conceiving a child by male humans they had seduced or otherwise used by various means.

In one sense, it relieved him greatly to realize that he no longer needed to worry about unintended consequences from keeping his promise to Leila. Not that he hadn't taken steps to begin with to ensure that such unions would not be fruitful, mostly through the use of condoms, but there had been occasional instances in which that option had not been available and refusal was likewise not what he could have considered a viable option either. The night he spent with Leila herself, for example...

"I'm not sure when you came to mind," Coral spoke up softly, not so much disrupting his train of thought as shattering it into chilling fragments. "I realized my only true option was another dunpeal like myself, but I also knew that I had to be a little selective about my choice given the wide disparity among our kind. I just had to look at the differences between Pearl and myself to see a perfect example, despite having the same parents."

D felt his blood grow colder as she stood up and moved to stand in front of him, her gloved hand coming up to caress his jaw. "What can I say, D?" she murmured softly, her eyes seeming to be unable to meet his as she spoke. "What mother doesn't want the best for her child? I want a father who is both strong and gentle, concerned and caring yet unafraid to do what he feels is the right thing to do. It took a couple of decades of searching for prospects before I came to the conclusion that... you... were my best hope."

"I'm flattered," D replied in a tone that was utterly empty of emotion.

She finally looked up at him, seeming to be hesitant as she studied the depths of his dark eyes. "I didn't think it was possible at first, as everyone knew you were... I won't say frigid, but cold and distant," she murmured as she reached down with her other hand to lightly caress his abdomen, pressing inward against his skin gently to let her break apart more of the dried mud and brush it off of his body.

"Then of course there was the matter of how you seem to be bent on killing every single one of us, vampire and dunpeal alike," she sighed. "That put a damper on my... thoughts of you, but it all came back to me when I saw you following the carriage out of the castle yesterday. I knew then that I had a chance, that if I could capture you alive then you and I could sort out things between us, that you would then be willing to share with me what you've shared with so many others in recent times.

"I knew of the stories, of course," she continued softly, "About how you would allow a woman to seduce you for a night after you both went through some dark trial or trauma together. I was as curious about it as the next woman, of course, especially about why you started doing so after a supposed lifetime of isolation, and so I tried to do a little research into it.

"For six years I travelled across most of the continent, trying to follow the rumors to their source. I soon began to meet some of these women whom you had allowed to seduce you and got to talk with them. Cassandra. Megan. Cori. Cheyenne. They each had their own stories to tell, and they all mentioned two things... that they were rescued from a vampire, and that you allowed them to find comfort in your arms because of a promise you made to a woman who seemed to hold a special place in your heart a long time ago. A promise you made to a woman named Leila," she whispered, giving D a slightly predatory smile as she saw the almost electric shock of recognition in his eyes.

D remained perfectly silent, trying not to let the rush of memories become a distraction. He had indeed kept his promise to Leila, even after her death and his fulfillment of his second promise to her. After her burial and once the other mourners had departed, he had left a bouquet of white flowers on her grave as she had asked him to when they were both in pursuit of Meier Link and Charlotte. He had saved a single petal from that bouquet and preserved in a crystal shard, weaving it into the clasp around his knife belt. To others it was simply a beautiful decoration, but to him it was a memento mori of her love and a reminder of all that she meant to him.

Coral said nothing for several moments, looking down at her ungloved hand as it moved lower to brush against the base of his manhood. She very carefully began to use her fingernails to break apart the mud coating, not wanting to be rough or accidentally scratch him in such a sensitive and tender area.

"I tried to find where this Leila lived and pay her a visit," Coral said softly, glancing back up at him when she heard a soft but exceedingly sharp intake of breath. "Oh, don't worry, I wouldn't have harmed her or anything, I just wanted to speak with her myself, that's all. Unfortunately all I ever found was a white marble tombstone in a valley not far from the eastern coast of the continent. I was able to share a few words with her granddaughter when I arrived, as she was just leaving after a brief visit, but she said she had only met you once and really knew nothing of what had transpired between you and her grandmother."

D just grunted very softly, having little reason to believe Coral had lied about spending so much time trying to research the details of his promise. He hadn't kept the truth from the other women, feeling compelled to let them know just why he was accepting their often quiet offers of both their blood and the warmth of their bodies, and so it didn't surprise him that Leila's name had become known to others actively seeking such information. He was all too aware of where his one-time lover rested in eternal sleep, and the flowering valley region that was home to her descendants was indeed where Coral had said it was.

Which meant that the baroness was quite serious about what she wanted from him. And if things kept going the way they were going right now, he had very little reason to believe he was going to be able to walk away from this one in the visible future. He had no intentions of cooperating with her, of course, but as Pearl had already proven his body could be broken beyond the power and control of his will. And when he added Coral's distinctly unbalanced state of mind to the equation, the results he kept getting were far from comforting.

He cast a reflexive glance down as he felt her fingertips very delicately rub the tip of his manhood, brushing off the last traces of dried mud. He was not in a mood for anything and the deep chill in his blood was more than enough to ensure he wouldn't be reacting to her touch anytime soon, but it was still a situation he would really, really rather not be in right now.

"D?" she murmured quietly as she let go of him and took a step closer. "Tell me what you're thinking right now?"

"I'm thinking you're out of your mind," D replied calmly, deciding it was best to try to jolt her out of her fantasies of him. Just as he expected, she blinked hard enough to be heard and jerked her head back slightly as if she had been lightly slapped.

"What?" she blurted out, clearly surprised by his words.

"You had me whipped and chained in your dungeon," D summarized in a flat tone. "I'm still sore from being crushed by the rock you dropped on me, and to be honest I'm still upset about the deliberate and callous murder of the humans in the carriage. Even if you ignore all of that, I'm not even remotely close to being interested in giving anyone a child, let alone to someone I'm not sure I would be able to trust to raise a tank of fish properly."

She simply stared at him in open disbelief for a number of moments before a very faint giggle rose up in her throat. A second soft giggle soon followed the first and it wasn't too long before she was laughing quietly, her gloved hand still lightly touching his cheek.

"That's amusing," she finally said, giving him a soft smile that disturbed him greatly. "Okay, so the time Pearl and I went spear-fishing when we were children was an absolute disaster, but that was ages ago and I've learned a lot about fish since then. And if all else fails, my darling little April can cook them to an absolutely delicious golden perfection."

D tensed as her other hand came up to hold his face firmly in place, not leaving him room to move or edge away. Another soft giggle rose up from her chest as she leaned forward to bring her lips into contact with his, giving him a very light kiss. "It's okay, hunter, I'll be gentle with you," she murmured in a honeyed tone. "I've been keeping track of my temperature every morning for ages, so I know when it's time to start stocking up on the feminine items. I'll be ready for you in two days," she breathed in a husky tone. "Possibly three depending on how cooperative my blood is. But now that I have you here? It should cooperate just fine..."

"What makes you think I'm going to give you a child?" D prodded, trying to keep a straight face and not either cringe or throw up.

An odd smile crossed her face as she ran a gloved fingertip over his lips, very lightly tracing the soft contours. "You will, hunter," she murmured in the honeyed tone that D suspected was related to her charming influence. That he had yet to even feel the slightest twinge was a mixed blessing, meaning that he wasn't in danger of falling under her influences but he was still worried about what it was doing to the symbiot in his hand.

"I've waited years for you," she breathed as she moved her fingertip and leaned forward to kiss him softly again. D held perfectly still, not making any attempt at avoiding her but not yielding to her in the slightest either. If she noticed his unwillingness to be kissed, she didn't give any indication when she leaned back with a faintly smug smile of satisfaction. "But as with all things, business does come before pleasure. You're still somewhat dirty," she observed as she took a full step back and studied his entire body with open admiration. "But that's what the water is for. Clean water, I assure you," she added with a faintly sour grimace. "I still don't know how Pearl managed to get her hands on that much holy water, but I assure you that it won't be happening again. Just give me a moment, okay?" she said as she turned to the cart and opened the drawer again.

D just sighed and closed his eyes, knowing that his situation had just became significantly uglier. It was clear to him that Coral was essentially insane, not able to understand that he didn't want to give her or anyone else a child despite her supposed understanding of his intent to rid the world of the taint of vampirism. So how could she possibly think that he would spend virtually his entire adult life doing such a thing and still be willing to father children to carry on the same dark blood that he felt needed to be cast back into the abyss of oblivion?

He did his best to ignore Coral as she dipped both a brush and a washcloth in the water before starting to scrub his body. The water was distinctly warm and scented with a very light fragrance that reminded D of a field of flowers. It wasn't strong enough to constantly distract, a minor fact that D was quietly grateful for. Being chained in a dungeon and informed that you were liable to be raped was one thing, but reeking of an obviously feminine scent was simply adding insult to injury.

Rape. It was not something people tended to think of happening to a man, as it was almost universally a case of a man forcing himself on a woman instead of the other way around. However, it was not unknown for a physically strong woman to take matters into her own hands, more so when it was a vampiress who was intrigued by one of her human slaves. The power of their charisma and the naturally weak wills of men for such things usually ended up with the man being an active participant at the end, but not always. And now that D was stripped naked and chained down so that it was impossible for him to escape or otherwise offer effective resistance...

Could she do it? he found himself thinking. The force of his will was considerable, even when applied to control over his own body, but he knew that even he had his limits. His body had its own instinctive notions of how things should work, as all living things did, such as how far it can be pushed before protesting in strident terms. While his willpower could usually overcome that to a certain degree, he knew that there were two things he simply couldn't hope to prevail against: the fight for self-preservation, and the fight for life. While the former was very much a survival instinct, the latter was of a more primal and basic nature and included not just his own life but the universal desire of life as a fundamental entity for propagation.

He knew the battle would ultimately be lost if she was persistent enough and if he truly had no means of offering physical resistance to her. Granted he could thrash around to make the task difficult for her, but he wouldn't be able to actually go anywhere and would only drain his strength in the attempt, to say nothing of possibly inflicting even more injuries on his already-wounded and still-healing body. If she managed to get him inside her then that was it, as he knew his body would succumb to the sensations sooner or later and cause him to orgasm. Whether or not that would result in a conception was another matter entirely, but by that time the question would be quite academic.

D did his absolute best not to think about what he would do if she indeed became pregnant with his child, not sure he would be able to bring himself to kill her. Killing the child, unborn or not, was very much out of the question as it would be a true and genuine innocent in the conflict. Not that he had the slightest idea of what he would do with it, assuming things ever got to the point where he would have to be concerned with its welfare, but the whole idea was simply a gallon of gasoline thrown onto the raging fire of chaos swirling around inside the dark recesses of his mind.

"Ugh," Coral huffed quietly, the edge to her tone drawing D out of his thoughts to refocus on his surroundings. "Such a mess. Hang on, let me dump this stuff," she said as she moved over to the control levers and pulled.

D shivered faintly as the floor below him suddenly spiraled open, sending the pile of discarded and dried mud chunks plummeting into the tunnel below. It was almost impossible for him not to watch as it soon disappeared from view, vanishing into the darkened canyon that he was kept chained above. The tunnel was sealed a few moments later as Coral shoved the lever back into position, causing the metal covering to spiral shut into a solid floor surface once more.

"There we go," Coral purred softly as she returned to the cart and resumed the task of brushing the remaining dirt off of D's body. "So how's your skin feel?" she inquired as she started to briskly scrub his back.

He would have ignored her had he not felt it would have been hazardous to do so. "Clean," he said simply, knowing that it was the literal truth. His skin felt a lot better after being revitalized by the elemental energy he had been able to absorb. The same couldn't be said for the bruised muscles lying beneath his skin, but it was still better than nothing.

"I would hope so," Coral replied with a quiet chuckle as she moved the scrub-brush lower. "If it's any consolation, the whip-marks on your back have healed as well. Well, except for the one on your hip..."

D cast a mild look out of the corner of his eye as he felt the washcloth slide over his hip, right where Pearl's final stroke of the whip had landed to rend both skin and fabric. The contact with the damp cloth sent minor sparks of pain up along his nerves that were easily ignored as inconsequential. Much to his discomfort, the washcloth was then slid around to scrub the inside of his thighs with a gentle but firm touch.

"Such muscles, D," she purred softly to herself as she worked. "And such hardened skin," she added as she brushed her fingertips across his thigh in a caress that was dangerously close to a tickle. "How long have you been riding horses like that? Oh, wait, you don't remember time very well," she sighed as she suddenly remembered. "I still think that's a pity, D."

"Time is what you make of it," he pointed out quietly, closing his eyes to try to better focus his senses. Her soft touch on the inside of his thighs was already starting to produce that faint tingle in his blood that he had come to identify as a precursor for arousal. It would take far more than a light touch to overcome his willpower, of course, but he knew that every little sensation was like a drop of rain hitting a sandcastle. Eventually it would erode the foundation and the castle would crumble, it was all just a matter of time.

"Mmm, tell me about it," she mused absently as she paused to rinse both the brush and the washcloth. She cast a quick glance over her shoulder to get an idea of what she had left to do, a somewhat coy smile crossing her face. She then set the brush aside and made sure the washcloth was both dirt-free and warmed up a little before carrying it back over to him.

D had started to open his eyes even before he felt the washcloth's scented heat on his manhood, but the sensation prompted them to open faster. He cast a glance at her and felt a chill sweep through him at the distinctly playful look in her pale yellow eyes.

"So how are you feeling, D?" she murmured in a honeyed tone as she washed him in a rather intimate fashion.

"I've had better days," D replied in a noncommittal tone.

"Have you now?" she purred quietly with a gentle flex of her fingers. "If that's the case, then I think I might be able to help improve your mood..."

D blinked and swallowed hard as she started to massage his manhood, a look of what might be described as casual lust forming in her eyes. "Coral..." he started to say in a warning tone.

"It's okay, D," she assured him, her hands never ceasing their motions. "I know I won't be ready for you for another couple of days... but there's nothing wrong with a little practice, right?"

D's mind promptly went into a hyperactive frenzy as he tried to think of a way out of his situation. A flash of insight came to him and he was about to tell her that he was still quite sore and that her touch was hurting him when she leaned forward, melding her lips to his in a searing kiss that caught him completely off-guard.

He wasn't quite sure what precisely happened then, as his mind suddenly experienced a momentary disconnect for some reason, but the next thing he knew he was having to fend off a minor invasion as the very tip of her tongue slid between his lips. The feeling was extremely electric and more than a little erotic, resulting in an increase in the temperature of his blood. The kiss went on unchallenged for another moment before he finally was able to scrape together enough focus to lean his head away from hers, breaking the contact.

"Coral..." he started to say in a low tone. His voice was cut off in his throat as her hands gently squeezed his manhood in a gesture that was both a warning and a caress.

"D?" she said very softly, her voice little more than a honeyed whisper as she gazed into his eyes. A faint gold luminescence was evident in her corneas, a result of her allowing her vampiric half to exert itself freely. "You don't need to fight me, I'm not going to hurt you. Far from it, my dark hunter. Now just relax and let me take care of everything..."

There was very little he could do as she leaned forward again, brushing her lips against his before moving off to the side to kiss the firm lines of his jaw. His own vampiric side promptly began to struggle against the bonds of his willpower as she started to nuzzle his throat, sending a series of shivers up and down his spine.

D quickly found himself in a crisis, not able to split his focus to keep his vampire blood caged and maintain an iron control over his body's response to her gentle ministrations at the same time. A distant part of him doubted she was doing it deliberately or was even aware of his attempt at controlling his body's reactions, but that still didn't help him one damn bit.

A dark shiver that came too quickly to suppress ran through him as she kissed his throat, letting her fangs brush against his skin. The feeling only further increased the fires of his vampiric side, causing it to thrash against his will like a beast against iron bars. He could feel those dark tendrils starting to leak through the proverbial cracks, very slowly infusing a faint blue glow in his corneas and causing his gums to itch where his vampiric fangs resided when they weren't needed or called upon.

He was seriously considering giving up the proverbial ghost when she edged away from him, the golden glow quite prominent in her eyes. Her hands slid up the length of his body from his groin to caress his chest and face, giving his senses a much-needed reprieve from her attentions. His sense of relief proved to be short-lived, however, as she took another step back and reached for the back zipper of her dark purple dress.

As focused on very specific internal control as he was, he didn't bother to try to conceal his surprise when the dress slid down her body to leave her as naked as he was. The rational part of his mind, or what was left of it at that point, suggested that she had discarded her undergarments earlier when she had taken Abelyne's blood, a visual that was violently quashed and ejected from his mind an instant later.

The primal look remained in her eyes as she flexed her ankles slightly, slipping out of her boots as she stepped forward to press her body against his. All that remained was the lambskin glove on her left hand, a minor curiosity to absently ponder until a truly chilling thought suddenly slammed into the center of his mind with the force of a baseball bat.

What if she has a symbiot in her hand? he thought as he felt his blood slow to a crawl. He himself had once been dressed in only a solitary glove when on the cusp of intimacy, back when Doris had bade him to join her in bed and he hadn't been able to refuse the call of her woman's blood. It had been ages since he had bothered to keep the thing confined by gloves, as it not only complained at regular intervals but it interfered with several of its sensory powers and he was forever having to take it off for one reason or another...

His worries of her having a symbiot of her own was shortly put to rest as she reached up with her right hand, gently slipping the glove off and setting it aside on the utility cart. A soft smile brushed her face as she reached up with her now-ungloved left hand, casually brushing her fingertips against his lips before turning her hand over to repeat the gesture with the metal implant that he barely had time to realize was there before it was touching him.

A sensation unlike anything D had ever felt before promptly flooded his veins, seeming to both tingle with electricity and burn with an icy fire in a truly bizarre fashion. He knew at once that the odd metal implant was the most likely source of Coral's hypnotic influence, explaining why the left hands of her victims would throb and itch. However, now that it was in direct contact with him instead of being exerted from a distance where the effects would only be felt by his symbiot...

"So what do you think, my dark hunter?" Coral purred softly in a tone he couldn't remember hearing before. Her voice seemed to throb and echo inside his mind like a ghost, seeming to caress his ears as it slipped inside to tease and tickle the core of his soul. "Do you like what you see?" she whispered.

His eyes were immediately drawn down to the soft curves of her naked body. The gentle swells of her breasts were not overly prominent but would still make a very nice handful to hold. Her nipples, visibly tightened to what he thought should have been an almost painful intensity, seemed to throb just faintly in the open air, begging to be touched and tasted. Further down was another soft mass of pale silvery hair, ultra-fine strands that did very little to conceal the velvety folds of her sheath from the admiring eyes of others, a haven that he would soon be allowed to enter to bask in the unearthly pleasures of delight found only in that most sacred of gardens...

"You're beautiful," D found himself saying before something clicked deep in his mind. He knew it was very much the absolute and obvious truth, so what was the problem with him saying so? Something clicked in his mind again, not so much of an idea trying to spark but a very subtle prod of some kind. Almost as if something was inside his mind...

Warning him that he was falling under her influence.

Which he was.

Idiot.

The realization was sharp enough to allow him to rally his mental focus, breaking free from the deep harmonic in his mind that was trying to lull him into a complacent void. He knew that it had been the psionic thoughts of the symbiot in his hand trying to reach out to him without speaking up, making use of the tiny segment of the nervous system that they both shared to reach him.

He had barely reoriented his mind to his surroundings before he was thrown back into half-chaos again, this time by the feel of her nude body pressing against his in a distinctly suggestive fashion. The metal plate was thankfully removed from his lips a moment later, serving to reduce the level of mental uproar he was struggling to control. The rest was effectively subdued when she pushed herself off of him with a gentle thrust of her hips that came close to impaling her sheath on his manhood.

D blinked hard as the world largely came into focus a moment later. She was moving around behind him, reaching up to unlock the padded flaps and move them into a closed position behind his back. He realized that he had lost the fight with his body somewhere along the line, his pulse throbbing in his ears in time with the gentle pulsing of his manhood as it jutted out at an angle from the rest of his body.

The world promptly tilted back without warning, the frame he was chained to slowly rotating until he was flat on his back. The change allowed his body to rest on the padded backing and take his weight off of his ankles, producing a welcome feeling of relief from the constant pain. The shift in weight also produced a new host of minor aches from stiff muscles that hadn't been allowed to stretch or move, but he was so used to such minor pains that they barely registered on his consciousness.

His reprieve was short-lived as she returned to his side and climbed up onto the flat padding, giving him a distinctly mischievous look as she moved to straddle his waist. "I knew you'd want to cooperate with me," she purred as she reached down to grab his rigid member, very gently massaging it.

"I don't," D blurted out in a level tone, actively straining against both the metal chains and her largely unwelcome touch. It would have been a bit of a lie to say it was completely unwelcomed, as the singing of his hormones in his bloodstream made her intimate touch feel more than a little pleasurable. Not that he was interested in pleasure at the moment, but simply that his body had other ideas and that it no longer wanted to cooperate with his willpower.

Coral simply raised an eyebrow in amusement. "Oh?" she said in a tone of mock-surprise. "So what's this then?" she inquired with a playful tug that sent an undeniably delightful shiver through him.

D paused for the briefest of instants to consider his options. He could fight her as best he could, which would have been laughably futile and would accomplish nothing constructive. However, he suddenly realized with an almost electric jolt of insight, if what she said was true and that she wouldn't be ovulating for another couple of days, then there was very little risk that she would conceive today if he yielded to her desires. But could he handle that?

He remained silent as he gazed back at her, not bothering to try to erase the dark look on his face as he tried to sort his thoughts out as best he could under the circumstances. A sudden veil descended on his mind as if a switch had been thrown, bringing him a measure of peace as he decided on the path he would take in this. If push came to shove... or if push came to thrust, as the thing would no doubt have phrased it if given the chance, D thought in a truly rare moment of gallows humor... he would rather see his own life ended before allowing himself to run the very real risk of impregnating Coral, even if forced into the act.

His mental focus was promptly shattered as Coral moved forward, holding him steady with one hand while she pressed her sheath against the tip of his hardened manhood. The amount of resistance was negligible at best and D soon found himself exquisitely ensconced within her depths in the span of a single heartbeat. Unprepared for her to make such a rapid and decisive move, he was unable to control his reaction as he both gasped and moaned softly at the wave of pleasure that crashed over him like a tidal current on a beach.

"D..." Coral gasped in an almost haunting moan as she rested her groin against his, her eyes three-quarters closed and a blissful look on her face. She carefully braced her hands on the padding on either side of his ribs, not wanting to risk putting her weight on his still-healing chest. A simple flex of her hips backwards almost pulled him free from her before she reversed her motion, this time taking her time in sliding down the length of his flesh as she used her internal muscles to squeeze him.

D simply closed his eyes and exhaled slowly, taking a small measure of comfort in the knowledge that his choice had already been made. He would save his energy for when it would count the most, fighting against her even if it would mean his death to avoid releasing his seed inside her when she was at her most fertile. But for now, he could afford to yield to her lustful greed as the danger wasn't truly significant. Yes, it was possible her timing was off and that her ovaries were about to or had already released an egg, but given the seeming intensity of her desire for a child he had little reason to believe that she had been anything other than vigilant to the subtle clues of her own body as it progressed through its cycle of fertility, her own circle of life.

He allowed his eyes to open slightly as she whispered his name, her voice clearly marred by the intensity of passion and lust she was experiencing as she worked her body against his. The world was tinted a mild shade of blue as his vampiric half continued to slowly break free from the cage of his willpower, a phenomenon that tended to occur whenever he was intimately occupied. It rarely was enough to trigger the full transformation and cause his fangs to emerge, but it still tended to bother him with the way it distorted his perception of the world around him.

His eyes closed once again as he felt his body responding to her, keenly aware of that truly wicked grip her internal muscles had on his manhood as she continued to withdraw and impale herself on him. There was precious little he could have done to respond to her attentions even if he wanted to, given the tightness of the chains that bound him and left him with virtually no wiggle room. He realized that it was probably a good thing he was tied down, as he could still feel a ghostly echo of her hypnotic influence resonating inside his mind, urging him to reach out to caress her, to taste her, to take her.

"D?" she whispered huskily, reaching up to carefully stroke his chest with her right hand. She waited until he opened his eyes to look at her before she readjusted her weight and leaned forward slightly at the waist. "I want to see if something is true or not. Do you mind?"

"You didn't listen to my objections before," he replied, trying to keep the worst of the bitterness out of his tone. "I don't see why you'd want to listen now."

Much to his surprise she immediately slowed her pace, letting the weight of her body impale her sheath on his throbbing manhood before leaning forward to put her weight on her wrists. She gently eased herself up a few inches only to just as slowly slide back down again, her breath drifting up from her chest in a deep sigh with each slow thrust. "Objections, D?" she echoed in a tone that he couldn't immediately read.

He took a cautious breath, not entirely sure if he should let himself get his hopes up or not. "I don't want this, Coral," he said carefully in a level tone. "I don't want to give you or anyone else a child. Or even 'practice' for that matter," he added in a faintly edged tone.

She tilted her head slightly to study him, her hips still moving in a slow but steady rhythm. "How can you say that?" she whispered, seeming to be quite surprised. "I've been waiting years for this. You are mine now, hunter," she cooed as she began to pick up the pace again. "You would be dead if I hadn't captured you, as my dear, sweet sister surely would have used her rail-gun to kill you. No, I need you, my dark hunter. You are the only one who can give me a child, the only one strong enough to be worthy..."

D suppressed the urge to snarl as he glanced away, realizing that he was wasting his breath trying to reason with an insane mind. Her increase in the pace of her rocking motions was starting to light the proverbial fuse, setting his blood on fire with the intense tingles of an impending orgasm. Perhaps he might have been able to fight it, to stave off his natural biological response to such pleasure for a number of minutes, but that would only prolong his... what, agony? Suffering? Could pleasure truly be classified as torture?

There were far worse things she could be doing to him, he admitted with a truly heavy sigh of resignation. And to be honest, Coral was doing a rather good job of pleasing him. Or rather pleasing them both of them, if the way she was starting to growl softly to herself was any indication of how close to the edge she was. He certainly couldn't take any credit for anything, as all he could doing was lie there like a sack of wheat and sport the proverbial sundial for her own selfish pleasures.

He paused as he caught motion off in the distance, glancing over towards the door to find Pearl standing in the open archway. He figured she must have just arrived a quarter-second ago, as her eyes were still in the process of widening in surprise and shock as she realized what was going on. Her mouth fell open for a moment before it set into a truly furious snarl, her aqua-blue eyes suddenly igniting like red-hot coals as her vampiric nature erupted into full prominence.

Her simmering gaze shifted slightly and D found himself almost physically recoiling from the sheer intensity of the evil look directed at him. If such looks could kill, then both he and Coral would have been reduced to piles of ash in an instant. Much to his surprise, she quickly turned away and left the room instead of charging in to unleash pure havoc as he feared. That only gave him a brief moment of comfort, as he quickly realized that he would undoubtedly be confronted with her rage later rather than sooner, and much like a volcano the longer such hatred was allowed to simmer the more violent it would be when it finally erupted.

The volcano metaphor suddenly proved to have apt timing as Coral drew in a deep breath and almost literally slammed her groin against his in a sharp thrust, contracting her internal muscles as tightly as she could while forcing D's manhood to squeeze past them. The result was an almost quadrupling of the erotic sensation of having him inside her, both from her perspective and his. The sheer intensity of pleasure impulses seemed to sear their nervous systems in an instant, obliterating what conscious thoughts had been running through their minds at that particular moment in time.

Their orgasms were almost simultaneous, his seed promptly surging out from his manhood in a geyser-like fashion while her own spasms were triggered by the sensation of him pulsing inside her. Conscious and rational thought was quite literally impossible for either of them for a number of seconds afterwards as they tried to recover, and had she not prepared for it earlier she would have collapsed onto his chest like a lead weight. As it was, she had started to twist to the side when she had tried that muscular technique she had overheard being whispered between women in a very quiet corner of a bar once, a notion that intrigued her with the possibilities but she hadn't been able to test out for herself until now. The end result of her motions was that she would up on her left elbow in a quivering heap that missed compacting his ribcage beneath her weight by little more than an inch.

It took a few seconds for D to recover from the intense daze, his vision slowly fading from a blinding white back down to a moderate blue as his mind began to process nerve impulses correctly. He wasn't quite sure what she had done to him, but it was not unlike the same tactic Leila had used on him the first time they had made love back in the cabin during the sandstorm. The ache registered on his mind a moment later, warning him that his manhood had just been significantly abused by friction despite being amply lubricated by the exquisitely warm wetness of her sheath.

He blinked as he felt his hand shake slightly, realizing a moment later that it was the thing wiggling back and forth in a subtle motion to try to get his attention. He immediately clenched his hand into a fist, the usual sign he gave to tell it to stop doing whatever it was that was annoying him. D had the feeling that it was simply trying to get him to refocus on his surroundings, but he felt that now was not a good time for it to risk detection by trying to rouse him.

"Coral," he rasped, pausing as he noticed how raw his voice sounded.

"My god," she whispered very softly, the upper half of her body lying in a heap next to him. Her sheath was still firmly impaled around him, her inner muscles holding onto him as best they could while she panted for breath. Her whole body was wracked with gentle tremors and spasms, suggesting that her climax had been far more intense than she had anticipated. Normally that would have impressed D, or at least a somewhat remote part of his mind, but given the fact that she had essentially raped him...

"Coral," he said again as he tried to edge out from beneath her. It was an exercise in futility, as he literally had no place to go in any direction, but he still persisted in the very faint hope that it would convince her to get off of him.

"Mmmm, give me a moment," she murmured as she slowly rose back up to put most of her weight on her lower body again. She seemed to wiggle her hips in an odd way before settling back down, keeping his still-throbbing manhood deep inside her. "D?" she breathed, giving him a truly dazed look as her chest heaved in a most inviting fashion. "Please don't take offense at this, as I don't normally use such language... but holy fuck," she moaned blissfully.

D had to briefly fight the impulse to grunt softly in agreement, knowing that it had probably been one of the most intense orgasms he could remember having. A part of him genuinely regretted that it had to have happened under the current circumstances, as in another time and place he might have truly enjoyed the experience of being dominated like that. It wasn't the first time he would have been on the bottom like that, as Leila had certainly showed him how wonderful it could be, but with things being what they were with Coral...

"D?" she murmured as she gingerly settled her weight on her knees, still keeping him inside her. "Are you alright?"

"I suppose so," he replied in an empty tone, glancing up at her and not bothering to mask the somewhat unhappy look on his face.

"You suppose so?" she echoed, giving him a rather bemused look. Her left hand came up to briefly brush her hair out of her face, giving D a somewhat decent look at the metal implant on her hand. He blinked as he thought he saw something reflected in the smooth surface, a faint flickering that could easily have been a result from the way the torches in the room wavered slightly as they continued to burn.

"I'll let you know when I'm sure," D replied calmly, prompting a very soft giggle and a gentle smile from her. "I have a question I'd like to ask you," he continued, figuring that he had very little to lose by asking at this point.

"Mmmmmm," she purred as she briefly squeezed her internal muscles, almost causing his eyes to pop out of his skull at the sensation. "D, I'll be honest with you. I haven't been a virgin since I was twenty and I've never been what you would call an overly celibate girl, but you are absolutely the best lover I have ever had. Trust me," she murmured as she leaned over to give him a very deep kiss that he didn't react to, gently jiggling her body to let the points of her nipples brush against his chest. "You can ask me whatever you want, my dark hunter," she added as she leaned back and settled her weight against his groin once again.

"I'm curious what happened to your hand," he said in a moderate tone, as if he wasn't concerned about his current situation in the slightest. He was, of course, but he was reflexively walling off his emotions while he tried to get a better understanding of his own thoughts and feelings about what had just taken place.

"Ah, yes," she said, sighing softly as she glanced down at her left hand. She raised it up slightly to study the smooth metal implant before reaching out to very lightly rest her fingertips on his chest, letting him get a close look for himself. "Nobody is perfect, D," she murmured sadly as she glanced away. "Much like Pearl prefers her whip and crossbow, I prefer a pistol whenever the situation permits. An old flintlock model," she amended as her cheeks took on a pale blush. "One powered by gunpowder in the breech."

"Brave," D commented absently, knowing just how dangerous such weapons were even in the hands of experts and weaponsmiths who knew how to build them.

"What can I say, I like the way it gets attention," she admitted as her blush darkened, still not looking up at him. She glanced down at her chest and reached up with her right hand to cup her breast, using her thumb to trace the outline of her areola. "To make a long story short, I was in the process of loading a charge when the breech-lock slipped and created a spark."

D blinked as she held up her left hand and made a gesture as if she were holding an imaginary pistol. He nodded in understanding a moment later as he could imagine how the gunpowder would have exploded and just where the fiery burst would have impacted against her hand. "I see," he said calmly.

"I don't know why it never healed, but after a few days I realized that I needed to find a way to protect it," Coral whispered softly before she sighed quietly to herself. She lightly ran the tip of her finger over her throbbing nipple before sighing again and moving her hips back, letting him slip free from her depths. She then moved to lay next to him, curling up on his right side and ignoring the awkward way D was spread-eagled from the chains binding his wrists and ankles.

"So where did the metal come from?" D inquired as he ignored the way her head rested on his shoulder and studied the implant. He narrowed his eyes as he again thought he saw something etched on its smooth surface, only to vanish an instant later as he tried to focus on it.

"I'm not sure," she admitted in a quiet murmur, suddenly seeming to be sleepy. "A trader passed through the village shortly after the accident and he had a small sheet of what he claimed was 'fabric metal' he had found in an old ruin. It was very light and malleable, able to bend and twist yet remain quite solid to the touch. Intrigued, I purchased it and had the village blacksmith reshape it for me with the intent of making it into a glove that would protect my hand. There wasn't enough of it for a full glove, so he used it to make the backing and used some scraps of sandworm hide for the rest. It fit nicely when I put it on, but then the metal suddenly dug in to my skin and I couldn't pry it off. The hide portion eventually fell away, but the metal remained behind. I eventually gave up trying to get it off and just got used to it. It looked strange at first, but it hasn't let anything hurt my hand since."

D blinked hard and cast a suddenly leery glance at the implant, wondering if he had been right the first time in the sense that she had picked up a very different kind of parasite than the one that resided in his own left hand. If that was indeed the case, it was the first he had ever heard of such a metal entity in all his travels.

"Unique," he commented after several moments of silence. He blinked as she lifted her head up and leaned over, a very soft purr rising up from her throat as she gave him a deep kiss.

"D?" she murmured softly once the kiss was broken. "Please promise me what I asked you earlier, that you won't hurt either me or my sister and that you won't ever try to leave me. After making love to you, I don't want to ever lose you. You truly are everything the legends have ever said about you."

D cast a sidelong glance at her, still not believing that she wasn't able to understand that he wanted nothing to do with her like that. "I don't think I can do that," he pointed out in a neutral tone.

"Mmm?" she murmured as she looked at him, her eyelids starting to droop. It was obvious to him that she was more than a little tired all of a sudden, leaving him with the feeling that further conversation was probably just be a waste of breath.

"You look tired," he pointed out, wondering what sort of reaction he would get from her.

A faint chuckle rose up from her as she leaned over to lightly brush her lips across his. "What can I say, D? I wasn't prepared for you to feel that good. Mmmmm, god," she added as she shivered lightly. "I can still feel how hard you came inside me, and believe me when I say it was without the doubt the most intense feeling I have ever felt before in my life."

Great, D thought with a truly sickening feeling as he saw the dreamy look in her eyes. He realized that perhaps it might have been better for him to have tried to resist her earlier, as it was likely that the experience would only fuel her twisted desires to use him to conceive a child. While the notion of a woman desiring a child in her life wasn't anything unusual in of itself, even for a dunpeal, he found it to be extremely bothersome to contemplate how she was trying to have his child by force. And unless he could come up with an alternate plan soon, preferably one that didn't involve his death, she just might succeed in getting what she wanted.

She purred softly as she leaned over to kiss him gently. "D?" she said very quietly, her voice taking on a soft honeyed undertone as she tried to use her charming influences. "If you make those promises to me, I'll be able to free you so you won't have to stay here all day. I know I wouldn't mind having you in my arms as we fall asleep in my bed..."

"I'm sure you wouldn't," he spoke up dryly, giving her a faint look of contempt.

Her expression seemed to crumple slightly into sadness. "So you're not going to promise not to hurt me?" she whispered. "After what we just shared? D, I know you're not heartless or cruel like that. Please, promise me..."

It took him a few moments to decide just how to reply to her. "Let's just say that I have a number of reservations against being bound by such things," he replied in a calm tone.

She seemed to study his eyes in silence for several moments before finally drawing in a subtle breath. "It's Pearl, isn't it?" she murmured in a sullen tone. "You won't promise me not to hurt her because you're mad at her."

"I wouldn't say I'm mad at her," D replied carefully. "But yes, I have my doubts that I could trust her to end her harmful ways and change her attitude towards humans."

A chill started to run down his spine as he noticed her eyes starting to fill with tears. Much to his unease, she leaned forward to kiss him yet again, causing him to instinctively brace for the stinging sensation that would result from her tears dripping against his skin. A sense of relief washed over him as she leaned back with no evidence of any tears having been shed just yet.

"D, please think about it?" she pleaded softly, reaching up with her left hand to brush her fingertips against his lips. Another icy chill crawled down his spine as he feared she would touch him with the implant again, exposing him directly to her charming power that seemed all too capable of dominating him. "I want you to stay with me, to help me raise the child I know you will soon give me. Two days, my dark hunter," she whispered as she gave him yet another soft, almost tender kiss. "I can hardly wait until I'm ready for you, and I know you won't disappoint me. Please, just relax and think about it, about how you'll be able to hold her after she is born. Or he," she added with only the faintest hints of humor to offset the somber and saddened look in her eyes. "I don't care if it's a boy or a girl, just as long as I have a child... and you. Please think about it, D. I'll be back down once the sun sets to take care of you. I promise... my love," she breathed, her voice so soft that he almost wasn't sure that she had spoken those last two words.

D said nothing as she uncurled herself and moved off of both him and the padded backing in silence. She moved over to her discarded clothes and scooped them up, not bothering to put them back on. She seemed to hesitate briefly as she glanced down at the exposed metal of her implant, tilting it slightly to study it in the light before casting the briefest of looks over her shoulder at him. She then turned and left the dungeon chamber without a word, her bare feet making no noise that he could detect as she padded across the room to slip out the still-open door. The door squeaked closed a moment later, followed by the deep clicking noise of the lock being engaged.

((D?)) it spoke up after it was sure the coast was clear.

D frowned and cast a glance up at his hand, knowing that the voice sounded to be more than a little rattled. "What?" he said quietly, trying to silence the echoing voice in his mind. He could hear Coral whispering those two words over and over again, acutely aware of the look that had been in her eyes when she gave him that final glance before leaving him alone in the chamber.

((You... didn't hurt anything in that, did you?)) it inquired cautiously. ((Look, you know as well as I do that good sex is absolutely fantastic, and that bad sex is still pretty damn good when you get your rocks off, so let's just skip that whole aspect and focus on the real problem. How are you feeling?))

D cast a truly disturbed look at his hand, unable to twist his palm around to look directly at it but knowing that it could probably somehow 'see' the dark glare anyway. "Sore," he admitted.

((You enjoy it?)) it asked calmly. ((Hey, hey, settle down,)) it added in a hasty tone as D's expression twisted into a truly dark snarl. ((Look, I'd have played along as well and with a smile on my face to boot, so don't think I'm trying to needle you or anything.))

"Then remain quiet," he said in a faintly edged tone, trying to get the minor flaring of his temper back under control.

((D, listen carefully for a moment, okay? That metal in her arm? I'm not sure why I didn't notice it earlier, but the moment she took that glove off my Astral senses lit up big-time.))

"Do you know what it is?" he asked as he closed his eyes and took a deep breath, trying to calm his body down. A faint tingle shot through him without warning, causing the corners of his mouth to twitch faintly as he recognized it as the warning sensation of the sun starting to rise above the horizon.

There was a faint hum in his mind for a number of moments, almost as if the thing was sighing very quietly to itself. The sound wasn't one that he was able to hear in the air, but instead felt along the mental half of its voice. ((I'm... trying to remember something,)) it finally spoke up. ((A long time ago we passed through a series of islands, one of which had that dead zone around it that glowed at night. You know what I'm talking about, right?))

"I do," D replied as the distant memory returned. It had apparently been the site of a disaster of some sort, probably caused by the destruction of an ancient legacy-era energy source. The blast had left a truly massive crater in the ground that to this day was still little more than a blackened pit. It was surrounded by a ring of dead land where nothing could grow in the soil and was actively avoided by both wildlife and intelligent life. A shallow pond formed by rainwater in the very center of the crater gave off a faint and distinctly eerie green glow whenever the sky was dark. He hadn't bothered to enter that tainted land, and not just because of the plethora of local rumors about how anyone setting foot inside the crater became infected with a fatal disease that killed within days, or how the water was really alive and would turn anyone who touched it into a zombie. It was obvious that none of his vampire quarry would ever seek to hide there in such a lifeless land where the dead earth couldn't sustain them, and so he knew that he didn't need to bother searching it.

((Well, I'll admit I wasn't paying too close attention to anything other than that really chilling energy field surrounding the place,)) it went on, seeming to shudder briefly at the memory. ((But for some reason that chunk of metal reminds me of that place. The trick is, I haven't the faintest idea why. I mean, it's not giving off that same kind of energy or even anything like it. In fact, I'm pretty sure I've never actually seen any sort of metal like that at all. It just shows up as this big bright beacon on my Astral senses, and that alone is enough to worry me. Not knowing why I can feel it like that only makes it that much worse.))

"That might be the source of her charming power," D spoke up, trying not to shiver at how easily it had dominated him earlier.

((Might be?)) it countered with a dry chuckle, drawing a dour look from D before he closed his eyes again. ((D, I felt it mold your mind like dough in the hands of a baker. Now we know why that poor girl Abelyne is so thoroughly under Coral's thumb. I mean, if you had the devil's own time trying to resist such a power, how do you think a mere human girl would have fared?))

"Enough," D murmured, trying not to think of it and failing. The image of Coral's smile when she had entered earlier continued to haunt him, the corners of her mouth still stained with faint traces of crimson that could only have come from drinking blood.

His eyes snapped open as he heard the sound of the lock being withdrawn, glancing over towards the door as it creaked open a few seconds later. He felt a pit of ice form in his guts as Pearl entered the room and carefully closed the door behind her, a dark look of brooding still evident on her face. Her eyes had lost their vampiric glow at some point but still seemed to simmer with barely-controlled anger as she gave him a truly irritable look.

He reflexively curled his hand into a fist, knowing that he didn't need to prod the symbiot to keep silent but doing so anyway just to make absolutely certain it would remain quiet. The sound of her footsteps could be heard a moment later as she made her way over to where he was chained down, seeming to take her time and moving with a measured pace. Her hands were empty and he couldn't see a weapon hanging from her belt, but that didn't give him much in the way of comfort as he knew that his own stash of weapons were still on the shelf not more than a few paces away.

She reached the bank of levers and pulled the center one, slowly bringing the frame back into an upright position. D did his best to keep his expression unchanged as his weight was shifted back onto his ankles, resulting in a series of sharp stabbing pains that indicated they still had a significant amount of healing left to do.

"You know what?" Pearl said in a measured tone as she moved to stand in front of him, her mouth still compressed into a thin and bitter line. "I have absolutely no idea what to think of either you or Coral at the moment. I know I've walked in on my sister and some guy before, so it really isn't anything new, but this one just leaves me speechless. What happened?"

D raised an eyebrow as he regarded her carefully, not entirely sure what to make of her demeanor. It was obvious that she was quite pissed at him, but he was also getting the impression that she was genuinely curious about what had taken place. Surely she of all people would know... or would she?

Ah... damn, Coral, what's with you all of a sudden? her voice echoed in the depths of his mind. He's mine, dear sister, and I'll explain it all to you later, Coral had replied. Sis, about what you said about not ripping his balls off... Don't worry about it, Pearl, I said I would explain things later...

He winced as her arm lashed out, the back of her fist glancing off of his cheek hard enough to bounce the back of his head against the padding. "Answer me," she demanded as the fiery glow of her vampiric side flashed into her eyes, illuminating her aqua-blue irises with a crimson aura. "What happened?"

"Didn't your sister tell you?" he replied calmly, bracing himself for a second blow. He winced again as she leaned forward against him, bringing one knee up to painfully rest against his inert manhood while she grabbed his chin in an iron grip.

"Do not play games with me, hunter," Pearl snarled in a low tone, her lips pulling back slightly to expose the tips of her vampiric fangs. "Not unless you want to say goodbye to your little friend," she added with a sharp jab of her knee into his groin.

D couldn't help the tiny droplet of sweat that crawled down the back of his neck, knowing that the truth was just as liable to set her off as anything else he could have said. "Coral wants to have a child," he replied in a low tone. He paused for the span of a heartbeat as Pearl suddenly blinked, the red glow vanishing from her corneas as if a switch had been pulled. "And it seems she wants me to be the father."

Pearl blinked again before her expression darkened. "Bullshit," she said in a soft growl as she leaned slightly closer to him, a faint flickering of red starting to return to her eyes.

"Go ask her if you don't believe me," D countered flatly, returning her gaze with an unflinching expression. Their eyes locked in tense silence for what seemed like a minor eternity before she very slowly edged away from him, shaking her head to herself in denial.

"You've got to be shitting me," she breathed.

"Let me ask you this, then," D spoke up quietly, still giving her a very solid look. "Why would I bother lying when all you would need to do is ask her for the truth?"

Pearl snorted quietly with contempt. "Easy, to try to save your ass," she snarled in a low tone. "And we both know how men like you would lie, cheat, and steal to bed a woman. I've heard the stories about you, hunter."

"I doubt you have," D replied calmly. He quickly braced as best he could as Pearl lashed out again, the back of her hand connecting with his jaw hard enough to briefly make him see sparks. Her hand came back to grab his chin in a fierce grip, forcing him to look up at her.

"Are you calling me a liar?" she snarled in a dangerously soft tone as her lips curled back to bare her vampiric fangs.

D simply gazed calmly at her as his thoughts suddenly organized themselves with startling clarity. "I'm not saying you haven't heard stories about me," he countered, deliberately keeping his tone steady to suggest that her anger wasn't fazing him in the slightest. "The truth of what those stories have said is another matter, however."

"Really, now," she said, her voice almost literally dripping with scorn.

"Whom do you think would be more credible?" he pointed out. "A nameless patron in a tavern talking of whispered rumors and decade-old stories that she overheard from someone else, or the words of someone who was actually there and knows first-hand what truly took place?"

Pearl narrowed her eyes as she stared at him before making a soft huffing noise deep in her throat. "Alright, then," she spat. "Tell me about Meryl."

D closed his eyes briefly as he searched his memories. "A werewolf hunter who slew the minion of a noble vampiress named Rebecca D'Caden," he replied. "Enraged by the loss, she led a hunting party after Meryl and her companions. One was able to escape the ambush, which is how word reached me of what had taken place. He hired me to free the rest of his team, though by the time I arrived at the castle two days later only Meryl was still alive. Freeing her and fighting our way out through Lady D'Caden's traps and counter-attacks took another day. Lady D'Caden pursued us into the forest and ambushed us on the trail with her remaining forces. It was all we could do to fend her off until the sun rose, allowing me to finally put an end to her and her pet werewolves."

Pearl nodded, having heard that much already. "Keep going," she prodded.

D narrowed his eyes slightly. "It was nightfall when we reached her home town. I was wounded from the effort and asked to borrow the couch to rest for the remainder of the night. I awoke later to her touch and didn't resist her desires, giving her what she wanted from me. Her companion, however, the one who had hired me, had apparently been a former lover at one point and didn't take kindly to hearing her confession a few days after I left. He started the rumor that I had forced myself on Meryl, taking advantage of her weakness when she was wounded and thus not in her right mind."

A faint sneer crossed Pearl's face. "Right, of course she came to you," she drawled. "And you can prove your innocence, I trust?"

"What did Meryl say?" D asked simply. "Or did you not bother to ask?" he added as Pearl seemed to sober up slightly and remained silent. "Regardless of what you or others think of me, Pearl, I know what I am and remember all that I've done in my life. You are free to believe what you want to believe, as it won't disturb my conscience in the slightest."

"Conscience," Pearl spat, bringing her hand up to grab his chin again. "You of all of us have no room to speak of having a conscience. After all that you've done to our kind, your own blood? How many vampires have you killed, D? How many of your own brothers and sisters have you murdered?" she demanded. "For all our desire and need for blood, your hands are the bloodiest of all."

"If I didn't have a conscience," D replied calmly, "Then why else would I have done this? Yes, I have cast countless vampires back into the abyss that spawned them, and it is conscience that drives me to continue to do so until this world is free from the taint of evil in our blood."

He grimaced as she shoved her palm against him, throwing him back against the padding in a sharp gesture that kinked a shoulder muscle. "You dare," she seethed through gritted teeth. "Give me one good reason why I shouldn't kill you here and now for your crimes against us."

"Who's us?" D asked. "The family of your human mother, or the dark blood of Baron Winters and your half-siblings born to his noble wife?"

It immediately became obvious that it wasn't the best of things he could have said to her. She seemed to blink in surprise for a fraction of a second before a truly unholy rage filled her eyes, the crimson glow of her corneas flashing with such an intensity that it made him squint against the forceful glare. The punch that she promptly threw caught him by surprise, not that he wasn't fully expecting it but simply because her fist moved faster than even his finely-honed combat reflexes could pick up on and thus allow him to brace for the bone-jarring impact.

His whole body rocked with the blow as it tore along his jaw, slamming him against the padded backing hard enough to give him a very light concussion. His shoulders promptly screamed in protest as they were pulled back only to be jerked to a sudden halt by the metal chains holding his arms, coming close to tearing a few tendons. The bitter taste of his own blood started to fill his mouth as the inside of his cheek was torn open by the blow, a rather revolting sensation that required a concerted effort to not immediately spit out. As it was he couldn't stop a small rivulet of blood from oozing out from the corner of his mouth, flowing down to collect in droplets on his chin that then fell to splash against his chest.

"You dare," Pearl growled, her whole body trembling with rage that she was barely able to keep in check. Her hands kept clenching and unclenching as she fought against the burning desire to simply tear him apart with her bare hands, to coat both the floor and her in his blood.

"Why do you let me live, then?" D challenged quietly, his tone unchanged from the steady tone used moments earlier. "If you think I've committed a great crime and are convinced of my guilt, then why haven't you executed me? Surely the world will thank you for putting an end to such a menace as myself."

Pearl scowled at him, trying to figure out just what the hell was going on all of a sudden. "What, you wish to die so soon?" she demanded. "Oh, believe me, hunter, you will not be getting off that easily. No, you will suffer for a great long while before I will even think of letting you die," she said as she shook her head slowly. "Your guilt is obvious, D, but your punishment will not be death but pain instead. Lots and lots of pain..."

D glanced up at her for a few moments before he took a measured breath. He craned his neck forward as best he could and turned to one side, spitting out the blood but making sure that none of it got even close to her. "I see your sister has as much control over you as she does over Abelyne," he spoke up calmly, as if he were commenting on the weather. He then braced himself for a second outburst of her temper as best he could, knowing that he would indeed be in for a significant amount of pain.

As expected, the taunt briefly shattered her control over her temper. He closed his eyes as hers suddenly ignited with rage again, idly wondering where the blows would land and only partially concerned if he would survive them. A searing pain immediately erupted across his jaw on the other side, followed by the sensation of the room spinning as the punch knocked him back against the padding once more. Another pair of blows followed, each landing on alternate sides of his chin that twisted his neck painfully and left more blood flowing from the corners of his mouth.

It took a few moments for him to summon the strength to open his eyes once the blows stopped and his sense of balance was allowed to stabilize. He cast a bleary glance up at her, making note of the look of barely-caged fury on her face as her chest heaved sharply with each ragged breath. He lifted his head up slowly, waiting until he was sure that he had solid eye-contact with her before letting a small smile of triumph form on his bruised and bloody lips.

The gesture seemed to completely catch her off-guard, resulting in a very hard blink at the realization that he was smiling at her. It was hardly the look she expected to receive from him, and it was enough to both throw her rage off-balance and make her suddenly question his sanity.

"What?" she demanded in a low tone, her voice marred by a tiny measure of uncertainty at the unexpected development.

"You have quite a temper," D murmured, trying to keep his voice steady and even. Both his lips and his jaw immediately began to protest being forced to move, sending waves of agonizing pain shooting across his entire face. "Such raw anger must make it difficult for you sometimes, always wanting to lash out and destroy everything around you. I would imagine it makes it difficult to find and make friends."

Her face immediately twisted into a vicious snarl, baring her fangs yet again as she visibly teetered on the edge of another outburst of rage. "You know absolutely nothing about me, hunter," she hissed as her clenched fists started to tremble from tension once again.

"I know you're a dunpeal," D reminded her calmly. "Believe me when I say I know more about you than you think I do. After all," he added as he lifted his chin up defiantly, "Aren't you and I related, having a vampire's dark blood in our veins? Or do you think Coral is the only one who understands what that darkness inside you is doing to your thoughts and state of mind?"

He quickly had to brace himself as she exploded into a spinning kick, the heel of her boot slamming into his stomach hard enough to drive the air out of his lungs in a mad exodus. His senses suddenly grayed out for a few moments before slowly returning as he was able to draw in a ragged and suddenly very painful breath. He didn't think that any significant internal damage had been done, but he knew that he probably hadn't mended enough on the inside to be able to withstand too much more punishment.

He allowed his eyes to open into narrow slits as she grabbed his hair and hoisted, yanking his head up so that their eyes could meet. "Keep talking," she growled, her jaw set so firmly that he suspected it had to be aching quite painfully by now. Not nearly as painful as his own jaw was feeling, of course, but she still had to be feeling the tension to one degree or another. "For a supposed legend, you sure aren't too bright. Go on, insult me again. I want a reason to kick you in the balls next," she whispered with a cruel smile.

"Why do you need a reason?" D replied, unable to keep the rasp out of his voice. "Why fight the rage inside you? What stays your hand, Pearl?"

She seemed to hesitate slightly, her eyes narrowing as she stared at him and tried to figure out why he was goading her into hurting him. "You're up to something," she finally said in a very soft tone.

"You can't answer the question, can you?" D replied in a tone that was equally as soft. He ignored the warning snarl in her throat as she tensed up again and continued. "I know there is a struggle inside your heart, Pearl, one that rages even as we speak. Part of you wants to kill me, to use your fangs and slice open every vein in my body."

"Damn straight I do," Pearl hissed, unconsciously baring her fangs again. "And you deserve it for what you've done."

"So do it," D replied calmly. "Prove me right. Give me the satisfaction of seeing you surrender your humanity and becoming nothing more than an animal in a lustful frenzy. Go on," he prodded her as she snarled and drew her fist back before halting in mid-motion.

"You must be mad," she breathed hoarsely, her fist wavering as her arm remained dangerously tense from remaining cocked back.

"I'm not the one shaking like a rabid dog slipped from its leash," D said in a neutral tone, hoping that he would be able to break through the veil of rage that was blinding her. "Go ahead, Pearl, hit me for the insult. Show me who is the better person."

He felt the faintest of twitches in his left hand but ignored it, keeping his concentration on the intense look on Pearl's face. It was obvious that her rage was only being held back by the thinnest of threads of control, but he could see the briefest of flickers of emotion in her eyes as she struggled to keep that thread from breaking.

"You're still fighting on the inside," he pointed out gently. "Something is keeping you from lashing out. Do you know what that is, Pearl? It's your human soul."

"You know nothing of me," Pearl breathed through clenched teeth, her fist still poised to lash out in an instant.

"Then show me what you are," D said simply.

He waited patiently for her to react or at least give him some indication that his words were reaching her. He knew that whatever she did now would be the deciding factor in how the rest would play out, either giving in to the rage inside her and likely killing him or stepping back to listen to whatever else he might say.

His expression remained perfectly composed as she very slowly lowered her arm and stood up straight, her chest still heaving from raw tension. Her rage was still very much present, the crimson glow in her corneas seeming to pulse slightly with her heartbeat, but he sensed that the thin thread keeping it in check had just gotten slightly stronger.

So it begins, he thought as he very gingerly drew in as deep a breath as he could tolerate. He knew that he only had one chance to truly reach out to her, to try to awaken the tiny spark of her humanity that he knew still burned within her hybrid soul. He also knew that he would have to continue to push her to the very edge in order to reach her, and that a single mistake or error in judgment could quite easily be his last.

"I see I was wrong about you after all," he spoke up, allowing his body to visibly relax as best he could. "I haven't met many other dunpeals who didn't act like rabid animals, bent only on killing and spreading destruction to all those around them."

"Is that why you hunt us?" she rasped. "You see us as animals? Mere game to hunt at your leisure?"

"I take no pleasure in what I do," he said, lifting his head up to give her a firm look that caused her to blink. "There is no leisure to be found in putting my life at risk every single day that I still breathe."

"Then why do you do it?" she demanded darkly as she folded her arms over her petite chest.

D sighed quietly and shook his head gently in resignation, dropping his emotional guard to let her see his weariness. "I have no choice," he said in a quiet tone. "In all my travels and for as long as I have existed, I have yet to meet a noble who didn't view humans as property or livestock, mere slaves or cattle to be used for a purpose and discarded without a second thought once they were finished with them."

"And?" Pearl prompted him. She blinked and unconsciously stepped back as D looked up at her, the sheer intensity of emotion in his eyes sending a dark shiver throughout her blood.

"Your mother was human," D said in a low tone. "She gave you life. Does that not mean anything to you? Or do you view yourself as being born from an animal and never looked back once you emerged from the sanctity of her womb?"

The burning rage suddenly gripped Pearl with an intensity that worried D, her body becoming as rigid as steel and the vampiric glow in her eyes becoming almost searingly bright. She very slowly raised a hand, pointing a trembling finger at his chest as she struggled to speak coherently. "Do not," she said in a tightly-controlled tone, "Speak to me of my so-called mother."

Her words suddenly sent a dangerous chill down his spine, realizing that he had most likely stumbled across a part of the source of her rage and not in a good way. He knew he still had to press on, however, no matter how bad the situation looked to be.

"What did she do to you, Pearl?" D inquired calmly. "What could she have possibly done to make you hate her and humans so badly?"

He could see the thread starting to break, becoming thinner and thinner with each passing moment. She suddenly took a sharp breath, and for one brief instant D thought that her temper had finally snapped. A very ragged whisper followed shortly afterwards as she exhaled through her nose, giving him a tiny measure of hope that she was still able to control her inhuman rage.

"Nothing, D," she finally rasped through gritted teeth. "My mother did absolutely nothing. You say she gave me life, but she did no such thing. She died when I was still in the womb, and my father had to free me from her body before she dragged me into the grave with her. I had no mother, and I was certainly not born from one," she spat, her entire being rigid with tension.

D blinked before he could recover his composure, knowing that his uphill battle had just turned into a mountain. He looked at her in uneasy silence before he slowly nodded his head in understanding. "How old was Coral when you were rescued?" he said, hoping that he wasn't pushing things by asking.

"Four," Pearl replied in a truly dark tone. "And she doesn't remember her either. Not a face, not a name, nothing. We didn't have a mother, only our father. And now, thanks to you, we don't even have that much," she snarled as her temper started to flare to the breaking point once again.

"I share your pain," D said calmly. He tensed up and braced as she became a blur, lunging forward to slam her fist into his abdomen in the same spot her boot had impacted a few minutes ago. The blow had virtually identical results, causing his lungs to deflate almost to the point of collapse and rendering his senses all but useless for the span of a few seconds.

"You know nothing of pain!" Pearl screamed at him, her face flushed with primal anger. She seemed to struggle for a moment before she lashed out again, her fist slamming into his guts once more as her snarl of rage echoed unusually loud in his ears.

D wasn't sure how he managed to hang onto consciousness long enough for his body to recover and start to function once again. His breath made a very odd hissing sound as he inhaled, sending intense jolts of pain across his chest like so many lightning bolts.

"My... mother..." D tried to say, fighting against the pain of trying to both breathe and speak, "Was raped... and murdered... by vampires. My... father... was later... killed by them."

Pearl suddenly paused to take a very sobering breath, his words seeming to blunt the edges of her vampiric rage. "Is that why you hate us, D?" she said in a low tone. "Is that all this is? Simple revenge?"

It took D a few moments to gather enough energy together to lift his head up, trying to fight the urge to throw up as his stomach continued to roil from her attacks. "Not revenge, but justice," he hissed as his body was suddenly wracked with a series of tremors and spasms. "Justice against those who would murder innocents for their own amusement, who would rape women and burn human children alive for the sole crime of living on land owned by a rival vampire. Justice against an evil that should never have been released upon the world to begin with, justice that has been denied for ten thousand years while countless millions have suffered and perished beneath the rule of the nobles. You claim I am the one who is evil for trying to rid the world of our blood, but what of your crimes, Pearl?"

"My crimes?" Pearl snarled back as her eyes lit up once again.

"How many humans have you killed, humans that you are related to because of your human blood?" D demanded hoarsely. "If I am related to vampires like your father simply because of vampiric blood, then why aren't you related to humans like my mother because of your human blood? How can you condemn me for what I have done without condemning yourself as well for what you've done?"

Her breath suddenly seemed to snarl in her throat, leaving her standing as still as a marble statue. She stared at him in edged silence for what felt like a minor eternity before she very slowly raised her hand, extending a lone finger to make a very subtle gesture.

"Do not try to compare us," she said in a low tone. "I may have the blood of a weak human woman in my veins, but I am not like them or you. I have not made it my purpose in life to prey on my own kind, to hunt them down and make them cower like rats before butchering them."

The faintest of snorts rose up from D's chest, little more than a spasm that could easily have been mistaken for a cough. "You're right in the sense that you're not like me," he replied calmly. "Unlike you, I have respect for my origins. And if you think I deliberately make anyone suffer for any reason, then you haven't been paying attention to what anyone else has said. Or do you think I find pain and suffering to be as exciting to watch as you do?" he added in a faintly challenging tone.

Her eyes narrowed dangerously as she stared back at him, her body once again starting to tense up with anger. "Alright, hunter," she spat. "Tell me what everyone has said about you that I seem to have missed."

"There is no honor in making others suffers," he stated. "This world is overflowing with enough pain and misery as it is. It would be an injustice for me to willingly or deliberately add to it, and so I don't do it. I've learned many things during my life, and the one thing that stands out the most, the one thing that sets me apart is my honor. Without it, I'm no better than the evil I've tried to subdue my entire life."

"Honor," Pearl sneered. "Tell me, D, what honor is there to be had in killing your own kind?"

"What defines my kind?" he countered in a level tone. "You seem to have nothing but contempt for your human mother, so why shouldn't I look down on my vampire father?" He waited for her to blink in surprise before he continued. "Like you, I can't undo the circumstances of my birth, but neither will I try to deny it. Humans like my mother are the ones who taught me about concepts like honor and love, and how actions speak louder than words. I didn't become a hunter of vampires simply because of what my father was, but rather because of what he and the others did, both to each other and to innocent humans like my mother.

"I was barely an adolescent when the Blood Wars began, a series of brutal and senseless wars among the nobles. When unable to directly strike at one another, they often turned their rage on the human villages that populated the domains of their opponents, humans whose sole crime was living under the yoke of their 'masters.'

"I saw it all from my bedroom window, the horizon turned orange from the flames of burning villages. I saw houses torn apart by werewolves and mutants, the occupants drug out into the streets to be violated and murdered. Children were brutally tortured for no reason, women violently raped until they couldn't scream any more, and not a single noble stepped forward to try to protect them, not even the ones who weren't under siege."

D paused for a moment as he saw a dark flicker of emotion in Pearl's eyes. He knew his own expression was openly haunted at the moment, unable to shut out the ghostly voices in his memories as they once again rose up to torment him.

"My mother..." he started to say before his throat briefly closed up. It took him a moment to refocus his mind and force himself to relax before he was able to continue. "My mother, my human mother, tried to forbid my father from retaliating in kind, and for awhile she was successful because of the strength of her human love for him. But then she was kidnapped by an opposing group of nobles, seeking to hurt my father through her. She..."

D wasn't quite sure why his voice quit working again despite his efforts, his eyes closing of their own volition a moment later. Much to his surprise, he felt a gentle touch on his chin, tilting his head up slightly. He took a deep breath and forced his eyes open, finding himself being studied by a pair of aqua-blue eyes that were only tinted with a lingering resentment instead of being overshadowed by a crimson veil of rage.

"Go on," she said in a neutral tone that he wasn't able to read. "Tell me what they did to her."

"We found her body on the palace steps three days later," D managed to say, his voice barely more than a broken whisper. "Naked, beaten, raped, empty of blood and life. She had been defiled in every way possible, a woman who had never raised her hand or acted against a noble in her life. What had she done to deserve such a fate? All she had done is loved my father with her entire human heart and bore him a child, the ultimate fruit of such love."

D felt a faint chill creep into his blood as he noticed the dark emotion flicker in her eyes again, suggesting that something he had said was striking a very deep chord within her. "As you can imagine," he continued after a brief stretch of silence, "My father didn't take kindly to that act and immediately unleashed a brutal attack on whose whom he suspected were behind it. That led to a chain-reaction that ultimately resulted in his death, but not before most of the planet had been cast into ruin by their actions."

"I know how the Blood Wars played out," she assured him in a flat tone, the edges of her mouth still curled down in a frown.

They both glanced towards the door as it creaked open and a young girl wearing the simple garb of a peasant entered, coming to a sudden halt once she realized that the room was occupied. Her hair was a rusty shade of red not unlike dried blood that contrasted sharply with her sea-green eyes. She was carrying a copper goblet that sloshed slightly at the way she abruptly stopped.

"What is it?" Pearl snapped as a faint snarl rose up from her throat.

"Forgive me, mistress," the girl said softly as she made a hasty curtsy. "Lady Coral asked me to give this to her... guest," she said, hesitating for a fraction of a second on the last word, making a gesture with the goblet.

"And what is it?" Pearl demanded, the harshness of her tone drawing a dark look from D that she didn't appear to notice.

"Water, mistress," the girl replied, clearly uneasy with the situation.

D glanced back at the new arrival, suddenly reminded of the fact that he hadn't eaten or been allowed to drink anything recently. As if on cue, he felt the faintest of rumblings from his stomach, a less-than-subtle reminder of his body's current condition. A casual tingle in his crotch registered an instant later, a very quiet message from his bladder that it was starting to become full and needed to be emptied soon. The faintest of disgruntled looks passed over his face briefly as he became aware of the sensations that had been quite overshadowed by the constant pain and events within the past day or so.

"Bring it here," Pearl ordered, her eyes remaining fixed on the girl as she quickly approached and meekly held the goblet out for inspection. She cast a quick glance inside before reaching out, taking the goblet from her with a none-too-gentle jerk of her hand. "I'll take care of it," she assured her with a faint sneer, casting a distinctly cruel look of amusement towards D.

"Thank you, mistress," the girl replied with another brief curtsy before she turned away and started to leave.

"April," Pearl suddenly spoke up, seeming to relax as she folded her arms over her chest. She cast a sidelong glance at the suddenly uneasy expression of her sister's slave before looking back at D, a dark smirk crossing her face as she took an idle sip from the goblet. "Tell me what you know about our... distinguished guest," she mocked with a soft chuckle.

April blinked and cast an openly nervous glance towards D, uncertain what to make of the situation. "H-He's the vampire-hunter known as D, mistress," she said, her voice wavering slightly.

Pearl huffed slightly and took another sip of the water. "Surely you know more about him than that, girl," she prodded in a dark tone.

"Mistress, please," April whimpered quietly, giving Pearl a look of pure terror. "I don't know anything else about him, only that he is a dunpeal like you and Lady Coral are..."

"Pearl," D spoke up quietly as Pearl's expression suddenly turned dark. He gave her a moderate look as she glanced at him, figuring that she was about to vent some of that seemingly endless rage at April and trying to divert her attention to him. "Surely the daughter of a noble like you shouldn't have to turn to a mere slave for such information. Or do you expect a girl like April to be as knowledgeable as you are?"

He could tell in an instant that his attempt at being a decoy had worked, her eyes narrowing and starting to flicker crimson once more. "I was merely seeing how wide-spread your so-called legend is," she snarled in a low tone. "And apparently it's not as great as you think. Return upstairs," she added flatly, not taking her eyes off of D.

"Yes, mistress," April blurted out as she made another quick curtsy before leaving the room at a rapid pace that wasn't quite a run.

Pearl continued to glare at him in heavy silence for a number of moments before the corner of her mouth twitched up in a faint smirk. "Cute, D," she said as she took another sip of water. "Not that I think she's the ignorant wench she would like us to believe she is, but at least she knows her place."

"Her manners must make you feel important," D commented in a neutral tone, his eyes still locked on hers. "But then again, I've never had to resort to being a bully to garner the respect of others, either real or imaginary."

It didn't surprise him in the least to hear the sudden groan of imploding metal, casting an absent glance down at her hand as the goblet was crushed in a white-knuckled grip. "I see you have a lust for pain," she said in a very soft tone akin to a whisper. The goblet was cast aside with a flick of her wrist, sending a cascade of water across the floor as it bounced before rolling into a corner. "Come, vampire-hunter," she snarled as her hands curled into fists as she advanced on him, "Let me satisfy that lust for you like you did for my sister..."

"If you think you can truly hurt me, go ahead," D replied calmly, causing his left hand to twitch briefly before becoming still again.

She paused for a moment, one pale blue eyebrow arching up in both surprise and mild amusement. "I see you forgot how easily I made you sing yesterday," she growled in a mockery of a dulcet tone. She glanced over at the utility cart and moved over to it, picking up the dagger she had left imbedded in his abdomen the day before. The blood had long dried out, leaving it coated with streaks of what could have been mistaken for rust from a distance.

"Physical pain is one thing," D replied, seeming to be unconcerned as she approached him with the dagger held tightly in one hand. "But you could make me scream until my voice dissolves in a gurgle of blood and still not get from me what you truly want."

"And what is that, hunter?" she inquired with a soft hiss as she leaned forward, her nose almost touching his as she held the tip of the blade just beneath the large vein on the underside of his manhood.

"Respect," D said simply. "True and genuine respect instead of the hollow echoes you're used to seeing from those who cower around you. Go ahead and cut me if you think it will do anything, but I can assure you that it won't. You can obviously force me to cry out in pain, but there are some things that can never be obtained by force. Respect. Honor. Love. So what are you waiting for, Pearl?" he added as she remained both silent and motionless. "Go ahead, prove me wrong. Cut away my flesh. Spill my blood. You can strip me of my life like you did my clothing, but you can never strip me of my honor."

Her eyes remained narrowed as she stared at him, the heavy veil of silence broken only by the very soft rasping of her breathing. She continued to stare into his eyes as she moved her hand slowly, dragging the tip of the blade down along the length of his thigh. She stopped after a few seconds and glanced down at what she had done, her eyebrow twitching slightly as she realized how deep the wound was and how much blood was flowing from it. A quick glance back up at him showed that his eyes hadn't changed in the slightest, still focused on her with an intensity that continued to disturb her in a way she had yet to truly figure out.

"What?" she demanded, her voice little more than a muted whisper as she edged the tip of the dagger back just far enough to give the wound a chance to close on its own.

"Take your time," D said in a perfectly calm tone, as if the searing pain radiating up from his thigh was inconsequential at worst. He knew it wasn't, of course, as the added blood loss was the last thing he needed right now, but he continued to project an outwardly calm presence so as not to give her the satisfaction of seeing his pain. "I can wait until you're finished playing pointless games."

Pearl visibly paused for a moment before glancing down, making absent note of the way his upper thigh was essentially covered in a sheet of blood now. A small pool of blood had formed under his foot where the crimson liquid had ran down his leg in a minor cascade, oozing forward until it began to drip off the narrow shelf and onto the metal surface of the tunnel covering.

She looked back up at him with a wary look in her eyes, clearly not sure what to make of his resistance. "What the hell are you?" she breathed as she took a single step back, still tightly gripping the dagger.

"The same thing you keep telling yourself that you're not," he replied in a level tone, "One born from the seed of darkness and given life by a human woman. I may have my father's physical attributes, which we both know are far superior to that of any human's, but both my soul and my heart are human. That is what keeps me going, Pearl, not my vampiric blood but my human spirit.

"Consider this," he pressed on as he saw her expression change. "If what you believe is true, that half your blood is weak because of its origins, then aren't all dunpeals like that? That we are weaker than our vampire ancestors? And if we are, then why is it I've been able to defeat so many of them? Tell me how it can be that a half-vampire like me can overcome so many full-blooded vampires unless I was their equal in strength and power? And if only half of that strength came from my father's blood, where did the rest come from?"

She remained perfectly silent and motionless for a number of moments, her eyes never once leaving his as she considered his words. "I have no idea," she finally said, her lips barely moving as she spoke in a somewhat subdued tone.

"I think you do," D countered in a tone that was equally as quiet. "You just don't want to change your mind about humans since it would mean you were wrong. There is no shame in being wrong because you didn't know, Pearl. I've been wrong before and I had the courage to admit it. It saddens me to hear of your mother's death, as it appears that you never got the chance to be exposed to the human love your mother would no doubt have shown you and your sister."

"Do not speak of her," Pearl growled in a very low tone, her eyes starting to flicker with rage again.

He simply gazed back at her with an unreadable expression, absently trying to ignore the faint hollow roaring in his ears from the loss of blood. "Now I know why you're so angry with the world," he said calmly. He didn't react as she lunged forward to press the tip of the dagger against the hollow of his throat, breaking the skin just enough to cause a single droplet of blood to well up and start to slide down his chest.

"You know nothing of me," she hissed flatly as her body shook with barely-controlled rage. "Nothing!" she barked again.

"I know enough," he replied. "You don't care enough about your mother to show her memory even the slightest respect. Even animals treat their own blood better than that."

"Shut up!" Pearl snapped as she drew her fist back, slamming it into his jaw hard enough to leave an instant bruise.

"You are without honor, Pearl," he murmured as he closed his eyes. "And I have no reason to respect those who don't even have the decency to honor or respect the ones that gave them life to begin with."

He kept his eyes closed as her fist slammed into his jaw again, once again coating his tongue with the bitter and metallic taste of his own blood. "What do you know about honor?" Pearl snarled. "You are nothing, hunter! Nothing!"

D tried to ignore her as best he could, turning his focus inward while he braced for the onslaught of rage that he knew that was coming. He figured that seven seconds at most had passed before it began, her fists lashing out in a series of powerful blows that he tried to roll with as best as possible while continuing to shut her out and deny her a reaction.

His senses soon began to gray out, his mind beginning to retreat from the pain and agony of remaining conscious during the ordeal. The blows were quite powerful but not enough to break any of his bones. It surprised him to realize that none of her attacks had landed in vital areas or places that could have further crippled him, making him question the nature of the fury that he was trying to weather. Had it been a truly mindless rage he expected he doubted he would have been left alive, which made him believe it was more of a case of extreme frustration for one reason or another.

He had no idea when it finally abated, fully expecting to feel the sting of the dagger slicing open flesh to spill blood and cause him to cry out as he had been forced to do previously. It was a metal sound that finally caused him to open his eyes slightly, a curious echoing noise that took a few moments to resolve as the sound of his dagger being thrown against the wall and clattering back to the floor. A sharp boom followed shortly afterwards, the sound of the door being slammed shut with enough fury to rattle both him and the chains that he hung from.

The air was dangerously still for some time, broken only by the quiet and ragged sound of his breathing. The constant thrumming of his pulse in his ears continued at a steady pace, assuring him that he was still alive for the time being. However, he wasn't about to place any bets on how much more he would be able to withstand in his current condition. Whatever respite the mud-bath and exposure to the light of the red moon had given him was long gone, leaving him even more depleted of energy than he had been before. What was worse was the loss of his life-force, both from the blood that had been spilled and when he had succumbed to the pleasures of Coral's sheath. Granted that essence of life wasn't something he could use for another purpose, but his body would continue to try to create more of it by instinct and simple biological design, drawing off what little energy he had left and leaving him all the more drained. Such a thing could even kill him, as one only needed to look to the animal kingdom to see countless examples of males dying after mating, sacrificing themselves to deliver as much life-energy to their mates as was possible.

((D?)) it spoke up in a very quiet and openly worried tone.

It took him a few moments to find the energy needed to speak. "Quiet," he murmured, his voice barely audible to his own ears.

((D, for god's sake, what the hell did you do that for?)) it protested in a soft but clearly rattled tone. ((I know you like to keep a stiff upper lip in the face of adversity and all, but why'd you deliberately piss off Pearl? You knew she would go psycho-berserk on you...))

"She wants my respect," D replied softly, trying not to breathe any deeper than he had to. He had taken several blows to the chest that had come close to cracking his ribs again, and one blow in particular had almost compressed his sternum to the point of impacting his heart and his lungs. The pain of his chest expanding with each breath was almost exponential in intensity, seeming to sear him once he got beyond a certain point and essentially driving the air back out of his lungs.

((So what did goading her into using you as a punching bag accomplish?)) it inquired in a leery tone.

"I wanted to show her that force couldn't do it," he replied. "That she would have to try something else if it was to be obtained. I have the feeling that she won't get much sleep today thinking about it, and that she might be back down here to see me before Coral does. Maybe even before the sun sets."

((Oh, brilliant,)) it sighed in heavy resignation. ((So she'll not only be pissed from earlier, she'll be cranky to boot from being short on sleep. Good thinking, D, I like your style. You might get us killed yet.))

"Enough," D muttered softly, pausing as he suddenly found his conscious mind starting to lose focus and waver.

((Uh, D?)) it spoke up, the tone once again becoming openly worried. ((Not to sound like a sissy or anything, but do you have any idea how bad you look right now?))

"I know," D said simply.

((Do you also know how we're going to get out of this one?)) it prodded in an uneasy tone. ((I hate to say it, but you're hurting pretty bad, D. If you don't stop pushing Pearl's buttons like that, the next right cross that she decides to toss out could very well be the one that punches your ticket. I've never been fully clear on how you view death and beyond, D, but I for one am not exactly looking forward to finding out the hard way.))

"Have you figured anything else out about Coral's implant?" he whispered.

((Huh?)) it said, caught off-guard by the change in conversation. ((D, that strip of metal is going to be the least of your worries if you keep on running your mouth. Don't get me wrong, both I and everyone we've ever met have been trying to get you to open up and talk a little more and all, but you might want to seriously think about shutting up for a day or two. I'm well and truly not kidding, D, you're not up to... uh, D? Hey, stay with me here...))

D found himself unable to answer it for several moments as his mind became a blur. Things refocused a few seconds later but a deep chill remained in his blood, warning him that he was on the brink of slipping into unconsciousness at any given moment. He knew that perhaps it was best for that to happen, as it would give his mind a chance at recovering from the sensory burden of pain it had been laboring under, but he also knew that there was the very real risk that he might not be able to claw his way back up into consciousness again.

((D, listen to me,)) it said, the voice sounding unusually faint in both his ears and in his mind. ((If April comes back down here and I'm sure she's alone, I'm going to try to talk to her. I know it's a risk, but... dammit, stay with me!)) it hissed as D's senses briefly grayed out again. ((She's not under any influences like Abelyne is and she can probably help. If nothing else, she can get you some water which I know you need right now. Food might be asking a bit much, but if she could try to give you water earlier... D? D!))

His senses suddenly grayed out again and remained that way, leaving him suspended in a quasi-ethereal frame of mind that wasn't too different from what one feels just before falling asleep. The waves of pain that had besieged him on a constantly basis slowly receded like an ebbing tide, taking with it shades of brightness until the gray finally faded down to a cool, comforting black.

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	4. Ray of Light

Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust "Blood Ties"

by Troy A. Stanton note: This fanfic follows the events of the original stories "Winds of Change" and "Final Hours" (both written by me), and also incorporates a few elements from the story "Drawing Blood" by Catherine B. Krusberg. I have her permission to make use of her work as a source of material, so anything 'new' you see in here about D's past with Doris that didn't happen in the movie is most likely her original plot material.)

WARNING: This story contains graphic violence and adult content, please do not read beyond this point if you are easily offended by such things.

((Chapter Four - Ray of Light))

The images that blurred past what remained of his mind did so in a jumble, not stopping long enough to be identified or processed in a rational way. He thought he heard snippets of song intermixed with fleeting tastes and ghostly sensations of touch and warmth. It was a voice he knew yet couldn't remember or place, the light feelings bringing him a measure of comfort even without knowing why.

The kaleidoscope of images and sensations continued to flow past him in an eerie montage, leaving him unable to identify or even isolate anything specific but giving him a sense of peace and solace nonetheless. It went on for what felt like hours before the blurs suddenly sharpened into focus, dragging him back into a suddenly tortured existence of pain and suffering as they resolved into something he could recognize.

A pair of sea-green eyes was watching him very carefully, seeming to be only a few inches away. The sensation of something both cold and warm at the same time registered next, feeling it brush against his lips. The taste that soon followed, however, simply could not be mistaken for anything else.

Blood.

The world was cast in a blue veil in an instant, his vampiric side not so much waking up as surging forward into exquisitely sharp focus to take total and absolute control. He swallowed the mouthful of blood and strained forward,  
able to smell the amount that remained in the cup. His senses slowly began to awaken as the vessel was tilted, allowing more of that most refreshing of red nectars to wash over his tongue and slake a badly-aching thirst.

((Told you,)) a voice said very quietly as the pair of eyes seemed to triple in diameter at the forcefulness of his reactions. ((Nothing rouses a vampire like the smell of fresh blood.))

"D?" a feminine voice whispered softly, sounding to be one degree short of openly frightened.

((Give him a moment to wake up,)) it said carefully. ((That first jolt is usually just a reflex. You with us now, D?)) it prodded as the world started to make sense.

D blinked as the dark beast within him started to relax, momentarily sated by the cupful of blood. "Wh..." he panted, wincing at how raw his voice both felt and sounded. "What...?"

"I can't stay long," April said in a hushed whisper, casting an extremely nervous look over her shoulder towards the dungeon door. "But I couldn't try to bring this to you until Pearl went to bed. Here, finish it," she said as she tilted the cup, emptying the last portion into his mouth.

D blinked and nearly choked at the sudden rush of fluid, managing to force himself to swallow it before he could spill it. He could feel it starting to revitalize him already, his body eagerly breaking it down to absorb the life-energy it contained. It probably wouldn't be enough to truly restore him, but it was enough to blunt his hunger and edge him back from the brink of death.

((D, are you alright?)) it inquired cautiously.

"Th... thank you," D managed to rasp as his eyelids started to droop of their own accord. His vampiric side was starting to become dormant again and he knew that he was still dangerously weakened from his wounds.

((Try to bring some water in a couple of hours, please,)) it said to her in a quiet tone. ((But again, only if you're absolutely sure the coast is clear. He said something earlier about how he thought Pearl was going to be more than a little restless, so she might be up and about when she usually isn't.))

"I'll do what I can," April promised in a shaken whisper, still keeping a very worried eye on D. "D, you have to stay strong," she urged him, one hand coming up to squeeze his arm before stopping herself, not entirely sure how he would react to the gesture. "Once Coral finds out what Pearl did to you, she will make sure it won't happen again.

((Let's hope so,)) it muttered darkly. ((In any case, you should head back upstairs. I'll keep an eye on him for you,)) it assured her.

"Thank you," April replied, casting a brief look of slight awe at the face that was embedded in D's left hand. Still not completely sure what to make of it, she turned her attention back to D and took an unsteady breath. "Please, D," she pleaded quietly. "Just stay strong until we can figure something out. We can do this, I know we can."

It took D a great amount of effort to lift his head up, just enough to be able to look into her eyes before nodding slightly. "Thank you," he said very softly, unable to say anything more as a truly fierce ache suddenly returned to his jaw.

The faintest of blushes tinted her cheeks as she nodded back at him before she turned around and quickly left the room, trying to do so as silently as she could. The door was eased shut and locked behind her, the soft sounds barely registering on his still-sluggish senses. A sense of profound weariness came over him a few moments later, forcing his eyes to close and slowly dragging his mind back down towards the empty gray abyss once again.

((D?)) it prodded carefully. ((Come on, stay with me here...))

"Give me a moment," he murmured as he tried to make a good-faith attempt at rallying himself. The sharp pains in his chest was starting to fade as he started to make use of the infusion of blood-borne life-energy, dulling down in intensity to join the literally countless other heavy aches that left him more than a little tired. All he wanted to do right now was take a nap, to try to let his body refresh itself and repair the damaged muscle tissue in peace.

((You're scaring the shit out of me, you know that?)) it sighed in a truly weary tone. ((I may not be tied too tightly to your nervous system, but I could tell just how close to death you were a few minutes ago. Remember back when you were shish-kebob'd on one of your silver werewolf spikes by Count Renard? Same feeling, D, and let me tell you it's not a pleasant one.))

"Tell me about it," D replied absently, trying hard not to remember how he had been able to feel his heart brushing against the spike with each throb.

((Err, D?)) it said in an unusually hesitant and tentative voice. ((You want to save your breath and leave the ironic sarcasm for another day? I mean, I suppose it is a good sign that you're feeling a little bit better and all, but you really should leave that to experts like me...))

D forced his eyes open, just enough to let him cast a sidelong glance up towards his left wrist. His eyebrow twitched up a fraction of an inch as he heard a very soft laugh in his ears, feeling his palm vibrate slightly.

((Made you look,)) it chuckled.

He closed his eyes and allowed the faintest of ghostly smiles to touch the corners of his mouth for a moment, feeling a measure of comfort from knowing that it was still with him. Indeed, it obviously had been able to talk to April earlier and caution her against his instinctive reaction to the smell of blood, sparing her a significant amount of horror. Not that she didn't appear ready to drop the goblet during that first instant, but he knew that it could have resulted in far worse reaction. Like a scream that would have let Pearl know a slave was doing something she shouldn't be doing...

His moment of humor promptly passed as he thought about the blood he had been fed. He wasn't sure where it had come from, but it had still been quite warm to indicate that it hadn't been drawn more than a few minutes ago. That might have suggested it was hers, but he couldn't discount it having been drawn from Abelyne's veins somehow.

((D?)) it inquired cautiously as it picked up on the soft grunt that had risen up from D's chest. ((Something bothering you? Well, something new that sprang up in the past five minutes, rather,)) it amended sheepishly, acutely aware of the constant pain D was in.

"I was just thinking about the blood," he said quietly. He opened his eyes to glance up at his hand as it laughed very softly to itself again, making him wonder what could possibly be so amusing.

((It was hers, though you missed seeing it drawn,)) it replied, seeming to sober up but still remain remotely amused. ((She didn't want to make a cut in a place where it could be seen, so she borrowed your dagger and opened up her blouse. Mmm, I didn't know the underside of a woman's breast could be so... juicy like that,)) it purred.

D blinked and cast a startled glance at it before looking around the room. He usually kept two daggers on his belt for various purposes, and the larger one had been the one Pearl had used to injure him earlier. He spotted it where it had apparently been thrown in a fit of frustration and rage, a small arc of blood splashed around the tip where it had been flung. His other dagger was still in his belt, although it looked like it had been hastily put back into place.

((Now there's a thought, D,)) it continued in an absent tone, as if it were daydreaming about something. ((You'd need to be super-gentle, of course, but what would it be like to open up a vein just above a woman's nipple to feed? OW D! Easy!)) it protested as D's hand suddenly clenched into a tight fist.

"Quiet," D said in a low tone as he closed his eyes, keeping the tension in his hand for another few seconds before relaxing.

((It was just a thought,)) it muttered in a sullen tone.

He didn't bother to chastise it further, as they both knew that he would never dare to do such a thing. A woman's body was sacred to him, being the bearer and nurturer of life, and it was only with her permission and at her express invitation that he would approach her for anything resembling intimacy, be it for the pleasure of love-making or the much deeper sharing of both body and spirit to feed. Even so, there were still some places on a woman's body that were sacrosanct, places where her life-energies had to be strong in order to fulfill her role as a mother and care-taker of her child. He might allow himself to please her with his touch or the kiss of his lips in those areas, but never with the kiss of his vampiric hunger.

Nothing, D, Pearl's voice suddenly drifted up from the depths. My mother did absolutely nothing. You say she gave me life, but she did no such thing. She died when I was still in the womb, and my father had to free me from her body before she dragged me into the grave with her. I had no mother, and I was certainly not born from one...

He shuddered to himself at the image, trying not to imagine being forced to rip a woman's womb open to free the child inside. He knew that doctors were forced to do so on a regular basis, a process known as a Caesarean section, but that it was always done under carefully controlled conditions and with extreme care taken at all times. But having to take a knife to the body of the woman who was carrying your child, a child not yet ready to emerge and who would be 'born' in a sea of blood from the process, blood in amounts that would drive any vampiric entity to the brink of hunger-madness...

Could an infant remember that? he found himself wondering. Human babies couldn't, of course, and he strongly doubted that Pearl herself could remember the ordeal, but what if it left an imprint on her vampiric side, underdeveloped and quiescent as it was in children born to such parents? Child-birth was a bloody event to begin with, but rarely was it that bloody when things went the way they were supposed to go.

((D?)) it prodded gently. ((You're getting that look on your face again.))

The quietest of grunts rose up from his chest, knowing that he had to address the issue sooner or later. "I was thinking about Pearl," he said in a muted tone.

((Coral's not enough for you all of a sudden?)) it sighed.

He ignored the idle comment and continued as best he could, knowing that he really shouldn't be talking giving how badly bruised his jaw was but still wanting to speak his mind while they were able to do so alone. "I don't think I can reason with Coral," he replied. "But Pearl might start to listen to what I have to say a little more closely. I think she knows her anger isn't normal, but she doesn't know what to do about it or what might be causing it."

((Oh, god, D,)) it said, sighing so heavily that it caused him to open his eyes and cast a suddenly worried glance up at his hand. ((Look, I know you've got this spark of hope lying around somewhere that you'll be able to open the eyes of other dunpeals and all, but let's be honest here, okay? Pearl is as evil as they come, and no amount of heart-to-heart talking is going to get her to quit having mild orgasms when inflicting pain and suffering on others. Er, not literally creaming herself, mind you, or at least not that I can tell, but I'm just saying,)) it added quickly as D cast an unamused glance up at it.

"I think she just needs to be shown what its like to be human," he said softly, more to himself than to the symbiot.

((Umm...)) it hesitated. ((You know what, I'll just shut up now, seeing how I'm not in the mood to get squeezed like a grapefruit. Let me know how it goes and try not to piss the bitch off this time, okay?))

D cast a truly glacial look at it, having a fair idea of what had gone through its mind a moment ago. Doris had touched his humanity back then, when the lure of her woman's blood as it flowed with the phases of the moon had been too strong to resist. He ended up taking her virginity... and she his... but somewhere along the way he had realized that he was still every bit as human as he was a vampire. Sorting out the myriad of unknown emotions and thoughts in his mind had taken centuries afterwards, but that initial spark of realization was one of the most fundamental and defining moments of his life.

Could it work? he found himself thinking as he closed his eyes and tried to idle his body as best he could under the circumstances to enter a state of forced dormancy not overly different from sleep. Granted seducing her was not an option even if the notion had appealed to him, but what if he told her about his life and his past in a way she might be able to relate to? Could he open her eyes to her own humanity that way? Perhaps that might indeed work... but how do you explain or describe the warmth of a human's love when it had never been felt before? The easiest way would have been to compare it to the love of one's mother, but if she hadn't been able to have that much in her life...

But what about Coral? What did she truly mean to Pearl? He didn't have any siblings, or at least not to his knowledge, and so he never had that kind of family presence in his life. But Pearl did, not just her own true sister Coral but the other children of her father born to his noble vampiress wife, Lady Valentina Winters. Their step-mother, he realized a moment later as it suddenly hit him.

Interesting, was the last thing D found himself thinking before his mental efforts paid off and his body gently slid into a dreamless sleep, drawing his mind down with it and sparing him the worst of the pain he was still in.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The process of waking up seemed to take forever before he finally slipped free from the bonds of self-induced and almost casual hibernation, allowing the nerve impulses in his mind to once again be processed by something other than simple autonomous reflexes. The pain was the first thing to register, a series of low-level aches that seemed to pulse and throb in time with his heart. The only sharp pains he could immediately discern were in his ankles, reminding him that they couldn't heal as long as he was forced to keep his weight on them.

A very faint grunt rose up from his chest as he continued his slow return to full awareness, realizing what the shift in pain meant. It was the part of healing that he truly hated, not the sharp, lightning-like stabs of agony that came and went in an instant at the slightest movement, but the deep and truly tiresome monotone aches of mending muscles. It was the kind of throbbing ache that could be felt throughout the body no matter how you twisted or tried to adjust your weight around it. And it never seemed to end or relent, just a steady mantra of subtle pulses from everywhere.

A slight tinkling sound registered on his ears, causing him to focus his efforts and force his eyes open. The sound soon revolved to be the very soft and delicate sound of a washcloth being dipped in a basin of water. It took several moments for the image to fully resolve, a pale washcloth tainted with a rust coloring as it was held by a gloved hand. His eyes reflexively tracked its movement downward where it continued to clean off his thigh, studying the gentle motions of the hand that guided it before following the length of the arm up to its owner.

"I see Pearl paid you a visit after I went to bed," Coral said softly, her lips pulled down in a mild frown as she continued to clean the dried blood off of his thigh. "And I see she wasn't overly gentle with your face, despite what I told her. How bad does it hurt?" she murmured, her eyes remaining downcast.

It took D a few moments to speak properly, his first attempt at moving his jaw resulting in a truly fierce ache that threatened to drive the air out of his lungs. His second attempt at speech was a complete failure as his voice was overshadowed by the coarse rasping noise that emerged from his throat, a sound not unlike two sheets of wet sandpaper being rubbed against one another.

"I'll heal," he managed to say after a third attempt, his voice raspy and still dangerously dry.

"Sure you will," she replied, her tone sending a brief shiver down his spine. She turned to her side and picked up a silver goblet from the cart with her ungloved hand, leaning forward slightly to rest the rim against his mouth. "Here," she said simply as she tilted it to let the liquid brush against his lips. She was about to resume scrubbing his leg with her other hand when she realized that he hadn't taken any of the liquid yet, blinking once before she lifted her eyes up to meet his.

"D?" she said softly as she saw the look of resolve in his eyes. "It's just water, which I know you need. Drink it," she urged in a whisper as she continued to hold the goblet at a slight angle.

D continued to look at her for several moments before finally allowing his lips to part, letting just a tiny portion of moisture to enter his mouth. He waited for several seconds to make sure that it wasn't laced or tainted with anything before swallowing, grimacing as his throat suddenly seemed to burn from the muscular motions.

"Yes, you're dehydrated," Coral murmured as she continued to try to get him to drink the water. "I sent April down here earlier with some water for you, but obviously it wasn't enough. I may have to punish her for letting you dry out like this," she added. She blinked and almost jumped back as D's eyes darted up to hers in an instant, looking at her with an intensity that made her shiver briefly.

"She's not the one I would blame for my condition," he rasped calmly.

"No, she's not," Coral replied, giving him a level look. "After all, all you need to do is promise not to hurt either me or my sister and not to try to leave me. Once you do that, D, you wouldn't need to be bound in chains."

A faint huff rose up from his chest as he returned her gaze with equal measure. "So it's my fault I'm here, then?" he murmured.

"D..." Coral started to say before leaning back and sighing quietly with resignation. She tossed the washcloth back in the basin and gently set the goblet back down on the cart, reaching up with both hands to gingerly rub her sinuses. She then looked up at him in silence for a few moments before leaning forward to rest her cheek against his shoulder.

"D, don't do this to me," she murmured softly, reaching up to brush a pair of gloved fingertips over his lips. "I'm... still trying to get over how intense yesterday was, so I didn't get much sleep. I know I'm a little cranky now, especially after seeing what Pearl did to you, but please... don't be mad at me. You know why I have to do this, why I can't risk letting you go until you promise not to hurt me or Pearl."

"What time is it?" D asked in a neutral tone.

"Sunset should be any moment now," Coral replied, tilting her head back slightly to study the side of his face from a different angle. "Yes, I know it's entirely too early for either of us to be up, but after making love to you like that... what?" she prodded as he gave her a sidelong glance out of the corner of his eye.

"You should go back to bed," he suggested in an utterly unreadable tone.

"In due time, my dark hunter," she purred suggestively, moving her hand down to caress the expanse of his chest. She caught herself before she could make contact with his bruised skin, casting a resigned look at the pattern of black-and-blue imprints that were too evenly spaced to be random. The nature of the marks puzzled her briefly before she looked down at her own hand, the realization setting in once she curled her hand into a fist and noticed how spaced apart her knuckles were. "Damn her," she whispered to herself, her coy mood evaporating as quickly as it had come.

She lifted her head up as she heard the door creaking open, arching up one eyebrow and casting a somewhat frosty look towards her sister as she entered the room. "Pearl," she called out in a level tone, pausing slightly as she realized that her younger sibling looked to have quite a lot on her mind.

Pearl stopped in her tracks and blinked, obviously not expecting to find anyone else down in their dungeon 'playground' at this hour. "You're up early, I see," she said as she made her way over to where D was chained to the support frame, the edges of her mouth turning down in a scowl as she took note of the way Coral had been resting her head against him.

"The same can be said for you," Coral countered as she stood up straight and rested a fingertip on D's jaw as lightly as she could, pointing to the dark bruises that all but masked the lower half of his face. "I don't suppose you have anything to say about this?"

Pearl glanced at the bruising on D's jaw and blinked, her pale eyebrows arching up almost to her hairline. "I didn't think he'd bruise that badly, sis," she said in a carefully crafted tone. "But you did say that I could slap him around if I wanted to, right?"

Coral narrowed her eyes slightly. "Maybe I should start slapping you with my fist like that, then," she suggested in a fairly ominous tone. "I thought I told you not to injure his face like that. And surely no amount of slapping could have left his leg covered in blood, now could it?"

"Settle down, Coral, I didn't break your little screw-toy," Pearl growled back. She paused slightly as her sister promptly blinked hard in surprise, her pale yellow eyes widening slightly. "Oh, yes, I know," she added. "I finished the clean-up this morning and was coming to tell you about it, but you seemed to be a little... busy... with him at the time," she said in an edged tone of contempt.

"Oh..." Coral said in a very quiet tone, a truly heinous blush rising up to turn her cheeks scarlet. She cast a quick glance at D before the tint to her cheeks darkened slightly, leaving her more than a little flustered. "Um, well... what can I say, Pearl?" she stammered, giving D a somewhat wan smile of embarrassment before looking rather meekly at her sister. "I was going to wait at first, but... you know I was never one for patience..."

"Coral?" Pearl said in a dangerously calm voice as she crossed her arms as tightly as she could over her chest, trying to ignore the sudden chill in her blood. "Why are you keeping him here?" she asked slowly.

It seemed to take Coral several seconds to remember how to talk, giving both D and Pearl several uneasy and deeply embarrassed looks before she finally drew in a deep breath. "Well... to be honest, my dear sister... I... I need him to... well... to give me a child," she finally blurted out, averting her gaze from everyone else.

"WHAT?" Pearl demanded, her jaw falling open.

"Pearl, don't look at me like that," Coral muttered as she started to pace the room nervously, her right hand rubbing and twisting her left wrist as she moved back and forth. "You remember how it was when Elora became pregnant, how alive and healthy she became."

Pearl blinked hard and cast a truly unsettled glance towards D, her unease deepening as she saw him staring back at her with an unreadable expression. "Sis, that was how long ago?" she spoke up carefully, unable to look away from D's intense gaze.

"I know," Coral sighed, seeming to be unaware of the exchange of looks between D and her sister. "But I just can't help thinking about it. I mean, you never wanted to hold Jenna so you don't know what it's like, but when she looked at me... I... just can't explain it," she sighed in quiet frustration. "But you saw how it affected Thomas and Elora, how being parents changed them."

"Maternal instincts can be strong," D spoke up quietly, drawing the focus of both women. "I'm not sure how strong it tends to be in nobles, but human women tend to manifest very strong maternal feelings when an infant is present.  
Even when the child is not their own," he added.

"That's nice to know, D," Pearl replied briskly. "But we're not human."

"You have human blood in you," D countered calmly. "And I'm sure Coral can tell you that it seems to be enough to garner her interest in motherhood."

Pearl cast a quick glance at her sister, her stomach doing a back-flip at the dreamy smile that was being directed at the chained dunpeal. "Right," she said, clearly unconvinced at his words. "Sis, you're starting to nauseate me. You're serious about wanting a child?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" Coral replied, giving her sister a genuinely curious look. "I am a woman, after all, and as we both are reminded each month our bodies are quite capable of bearing children. So why not?"

Pearl just slowly shook her head in disbelief, realizing that what D had said earlier was very much the truth. "Wait, wait," she said, making a rather shaky gesture with one hand. "Okay, I can handle the idea of you wanting to have a child, that's not the problem."

"So what is the problem?" Coral prompted lightly.

"WHY HIM?" Pearl blurted out, jabbing a finger in D's direction. "Holy shit, sis, could you have picked anyone more dangerous? He's a killer who hunts people like you and me! Of all the people in the world to get knocked up by, why him?"

Coral sighed softly and reached up to massage the bridge of her nose. "As I told him," she said gently, "I wanted the father to be the best there was. Who else is stronger than D, hmm? Nobles cringe at his name, even the old ones like Countess MacDara and Count Niles. That tells you what kind of power he has, and that's the kind of power I would want for my child."

"Coral?" Pearl said slowly and clearly. "You really, really need to stop and think this one over very, very carefully. The only reason we're still even alive right now is because of those adamantium chains, and the moment those get taken off? We're dead," she stated firmly. "He's going to kill us."

"Not necessarily," Coral replied, her tone turning honeyed as she moved over to D to run her ungloved hand along his arm. "If he promises not to hurt us or try to run away, he can be unchained and allowed to move around."

"BULLSHIT!" Pearl gasped, startled by the realization that her sister had even given the notion any thought. "If he's loose, we're dead!"

Coral simply smiled at her younger sister. "Ask him why he's still tied up," she said lightly, gently stroking D's bicep.

Pearl seemed to freeze like a statue before she very slowly shifted her focus over to D, suddenly aware of the intensity of his gaze on her once again. "Alright, hunter," she said in a low tone as she felt the temperature of her blood drop by what felt like a good thirty degrees. "Tell me why you're still tied up."

The softest of sighs drifted up from D's chest before he gingerly inhaled, still able to feel a sharp stabbing in his bruised chest. "Your sister wanted me to promise two things to her," he explained quietly. "First, not to try to harm or act against either her or you, and second, to not try to escape from her control. Needless to say, I refused to be bound in even more chains."

"You must be joking," Pearl said, giving Coral a disturbed look. The look she got in return turned her blood even colder, realizing that her sister was being quite serious about unbinding D from the chains if he made that promise to her. "What the hell, Coral? How can you possibly trust him like that?"

"Honor."

Both Coral and Pearl blinked before glancing over to D in unison. Coral had been drawing in a breath to speak when D said the single word, allowing her to remain silent. Pearl seemed to be stunned by the notion, carefully moving forward until she was within arm's-reach of him.

"What do you mean?" she demanded in a low tone.

"Your sister knows how much I value honor," D explained, lifting his head up to give Pearl a piercing look that caused her to edge back just slightly. "Not just my own, but the honor of others as well. I don't make promises I'm unable or otherwise unwilling to keep. I cannot in good conscience keep such a promise, and so I haven't bothered to make it nor will I lie about it."

Pearl cast an unsettled look towards Coral before returning her focus to D. "So let me get this right," she said in a very careful tone. "My sister has what the humans call a 'brain fart' and decides to offer to let you out if you just make a simple promise to her. And you said no?"

"That's right," D replied simply.

"And I was starting to think she was touched in the head?" Pearl gasped as she leaned back and started to laugh. It was a somewhat bitter sound that lasted for several seconds before she started to sober up, looking back down at him with a mild smirk of disbelief etched on her lips. "Humor me for a moment here and tell me why you didn't say yes and turned on her the moment you were free from the chains."

D snorted quietly to himself and shook his head. "That would have been a dishonorable thing to do," he replied calmly.

"So?" Pearl countered. "You could have killed the both of us and nobody would ever have known about it."

Both women blinked and edged back as D's head rose up sharply, a dark scowl marring his face as he gave Pearl a look of open contempt. "Quite the contrary," he said in a level tone. "I would have known. As I tried to tell you earlier, nobody else can take away or taint my honor. Only I can do that, and not just breaking a promise made in good-faith but turning around and then betraying the one it was made to would be so dishonorable as to be despicable."

Pearl glanced over at Coral for several seconds, trying to get a feel for what the other woman was thinking before shaking her head slowly. "I guess I just don't get it," she admitted calmly as she looked back at D. "If I were in your boots, I'd have done that in a heartbeat."

"I would expect nothing less from you, Pearl," D replied calmly. "But I doubt anyone would have considered offering you the same deal.

The aqua-eyed woman immediately narrowed her eyes, her hands starting to clench into fists. "And why is that, hunter?" she growled in a low tone.

"Because you are without honor," D said simply, giving her a neutral look. "You only understand concepts like strength and domination. Might makes right, as some have said. The strong shall live and the weak shall die."

Pearl simply raised an eyebrow, casting an absent glance over at Coral as the gray-haired woman silently moved over to the cart to pick up the silver goblet of water. "You say that like it's not the truth," she pointed out.

D glanced up at her for several moments before he closed his eyes. "And who gets to argue the opposing view?" he countered. "Certainly not the weak, as they don't get the chance. Hence all that's left are the dominant views of the strong. That doesn't make it any more right or any less wrong."

"Whatever," Pearl said with a dismissive gesture. "What's that?" she said to Coral in a muted tone.

"Water," Coral replied as she took a casual sip. "Speaking of which, you have a bit of explaining to do," she added in a tone of faint warning.

"About...?" Pearl prompted. She paused as Coral simply pointed to the crushed copper goblet lying several feet away. "Oh, that. He pissed me off," she replied with another gesture of dismissal.

Coral raised an eyebrow, giving her sister a distinctly unimpressed look. "Be grateful I'm not as easy to 'piss off' as you are," she rumbled darkly. "That was part of the set we got from Grandma Kaitlyn ages ago, remember?"

"I'll take your word for it," Pearl shrugged. "If you're getting that upset over it, I'll have the village blacksmith hammer it back out later."

"Mmm hmm," Coral hummed absently to herself as she studied D again.

"Pearl," D said quietly, causing the other woman to cast a wary glance at him. "I take it nobody has ever tried to explain the concept of honor to you?"

"Someone probably did at some point," Pearl said as she crossed her arms over her petite chest with an almost silent huff. "I probably just blew it off as nonsense, since I haven't needed to worry about it so far."

D remained silent for a number of moments, his eyes still closed as he briefly turned his focus inward to see if he could control or otherwise ignore the throbbing aches and pains that were besieging him. The worst ones were in his jaw and along his upper chest where she had struck him with force. Had he been human it would have likely broken several bones if not killed him, but as a dunpeal who was both hardier and capable of regenerating his wounds, all her blows had done was abuse the living hell out of already-sore muscles and skin.

"I remember the first time my mother took me with her when she needed to talk to the village elder about something," D spoke up in a soft voice, causing both women to take an unconscious step forward to better hear him. "He was a quiet man whom my father respected as a trustworthy and wise man, one able to tend to the needs of the village with little oversight. He had a number of odd things in his house that caught my eye, one of which was a glass bottle of some unknown fluid.

"When I asked him if I could examine it closely, he said he would allow me to do so but only if I promised not to open it or break it. He went on to say that he trusted my mother implicitly, and that by extension he could rely on my honor to take care of it. I asked him why my mother's trust mattered when it was in my hands, and he simply smiled at me and had me sit down on the floor with him.

"'I know of you, D, but I don't know you,' he said. 'Normally when you first try to trust someone you don't use something valuable like this. After all, they could break it. However, I trust your mother's judgment, and if she believes you can be careful enough with it then I will trust you and give you the chance to demonstrate your honor by keeping your word.'

"I remember looking at the bottle for awhile before asking him what would happen if it got broken by accident, and he just laughed softly to himself. 'Two things,' he said. 'First, I will be deprived of a rather precious gift your father gave me. The second, however, is that I won't be able to trust you again in the future, nor will anyone else.'

"I asked him why nobody else would trust me, and he smiled at me. 'Honor is like a spider-web, D. Each strand is difficult to build and can be broken quite easily. For example, say I trust you with the bottle. One of two things will then happen, either you will break it or you will return it intact. As I said, I only know of you, I don't know you for myself. The only way I can get to know you is to trust you with something and see how it plays out. If I were to trust you once and you break that trust, then I see no reason to trust you a second time. What's more, others will hear of it from me, as people like I and your mother talk with one another.

"'D made a promise and broke it, they will say. Why should we trust him when he broke his promise to old Heyworth? That will be your reputation, then, passed from one person to another. But what if I were to trust you and you did not break that trust? It would mean I could trust you again, knowing that you didn't break it the first time. Others too would hear of it and be willing to trust you as well. He made a promise and kept it, they will say. They won't know who you are, D, but they will know of you. They will know of your honor and reputation, all based on the words of others, and sometimes that is all that is available to measure how a person is.

"'And honor, D, is knowing when to make a promise and when not to. You've asked to hold this bottle, and the condition for doing so is not dropping it or breaking it even by accident. If you know you cannot do that, or know that the risk is too great that it might be dropped, then there is no shame in changing your mind. There is honor in that, too. He knows his limits, they will say, he knows when he can trust himself. We know that if he asks, we can trust him because he wouldn't ask if he wasn't sure of himself.

"'That is honor, D, that is the spider-web of trust,' he said as he stood back up. 'The trust between you and me is but one single strand, tied to all the others by similar bonds of trust and faith. A broken promise can ruin your honor like a broken strand can ruin an entire web. Maybe the web will not come down at first, but sooner or later it will fail and the threads around it will start to weaken and snap as well. I will trust you because I know I can trust your mother, using the strength of her strand to start the process of building your own thread.'"

D finally opened his eyes and lifted his head up to look at them. Pearl seemed to be deeply contemplative of something, almost but not quite lost in deep thought. Coral was giving him a soft smile, a sort of knowing look of approval that chilled his blood. He could almost hear the thoughts about how his beliefs would influence her child, leaving him wondering if there was any other way out of his situation other than killing her.

"That was beautiful, D," Coral murmured as she moved over to him, bringing the goblet up to his lips.

"Thank you," D said quietly. He cast a measured look at her before taking a single tiny sip, just enough to wet his tongue and ease the dryness that was still plaguing his throat. He glanced over at Pearl and was mildly surprised to see that she was still lost in thought. "Pearl," he spoke up gently.

"Interesting concept," Pearl admitted as she seemed to snap out of her thoughts. "However, I'm still not really sure how it ties in with what you said earlier."

"It's simple," D replied calmly, tilting his head away from the goblet to indicate he didn't want any more. "As I said, only what I do can influence my honor. Actions speak louder than words, and nobody can force me to break a promise or dishonor myself. And regardless of what anyone else thinks of me, I will always know the truth. That might not mean anything to you, Pearl, but as I said, I have a conscience I have to deal with until my life is ended. My honor is what sets me apart from everyone else, and without it I am nothing more than the bloody-handed killer you believe me to be."

Pearl remained quiet as she studied him, absently watching as Coral tried to get him to drink more of the water. "Problem, hunter?" she spoke up as she caught the look D cast at Coral, causing the other woman to raise her eyebrow and remove the goblet from his lips with a faintly upset look.

"Consider the circumstances," D said as he glanced over at her. "I'm sure you would have a few problems of your own if you were in my position."

"A position that can be changed with a few simple words, D," Coral spoke up in a quiet tone. "All you need to do is promise me not to hurt me or my dear little sister, and promise me you won't ever try to run away from me."

The faintest of huffing noises drifted up from his chest. "I admire your focus and dedication towards a goal," he murmured. "However, you still have some room for improvement when it comes to confronting reality. You're asking too much of me, and so I have to decline your offer."

"D, how can you say that?" Coral pleaded softly, seeming to be genuinely upset by his refusal. "After what we shared last night?"

"Ugh," Pearl muttered to herself as she glanced away, trying to get the visual out of her mind again.

"Oh, now what, Pearl?" Coral sighed as she turned around to give her a pained look, absently swirling the goblet's contents around.

Pearl just rolled her eyes at the ceiling. "Nothing, sis," she said in a tone as flat as paved asphalt.

"You can tell me, Pearl," Coral spoke up, her tone turning honeyed as she gave her sister a coy smile. "You know I've never made fun of your thoughts."

"Ugh," Pearl grunted again as she absently started to scratch the back of her left hand. "It's nothing, really, just my skin crawling from walking in on the two of you," she said, casting a dark look at D. "I still say he's far too dangerous to be keeping around for casual itch-scratching."

"Oh, here we go again," Coral moaned softly as she craned her head back to study the ceiling. "Look, you know why I'm keeping him here and I'd hardly call that a casual reason. Besides, when was the last time you had someone in your bed working out those really deep muscle kinks?" she added pointedly.

"Gee, I don't know, sis," Pearl shot back in a poisonous tone. "When was the last time you let me bring someone in here without you screwing them first and killing them before I can get a chance to have my own fun?"

"It's not my fault he died!" Coral protested in a plaintive tone, giving her sister a truly apologetic look. "I didn't know he had a weak heart, okay? Besides, he was the one who started it with the comment about my breasts."

"He was chained up," Pearl growled. "He couldn't have done anything on his own."

"I got you a new one, didn't I?" Coral reminded her gently.

"He didn't interest me like the first one did," Pearl countered darkly. "Even less so after you bedded him too."

"Oh, come on, you said you didn't want him so I figured why let him go to waste?" Coral sighed. "You have to admit you're not easy to please, Pearl."

Pearl snorted in contempt and turned around, her gaze coming to rest on the shelf full of D's equipment. "And you're far too easy to please, sis," she grumbled.

The gray-haired woman just rolled her eyes and glanced over at D, pausing as she saw the look of patient suffering on his face. "I'm sorry about this," she said very quietly to him, reaching out to rub his arm gently. "But still, she's my sister, so what can I do?"

He remained silent as the tingle of the setting sun shot through him, a very subtle sensation that instinctively brought him a measure of relief. He knew that if things got worse tonight, he would be spared the ordeal of being seared by the rays of the sun. What was better, he might even be able to get one of them to open the ceiling hatch again and let the light of the red moon shine down on him.

"Ooooh," Coral purred as she briefly wiggled her hips. "That tickled."

"Like I said, sis," Pearl muttered darkly. "Entirely too easy to please."

Coral cast a bemused glance over her shoulder. "Tell me you don't like feeling that as well," she challenged with a faint hint of a smile.

Pearl paused and cast a sidelong glance back at her elder sister. "That depends on what feeling we're talking about," she replied in an edged tone.

"Oh, listen to you," Coral sighed. She drew in a breath to say more when the door creaked open, allowing her slave to stick her head inside with a very uneasy look on her face. "Is everything okay, Abby?" she called out.

"Mister Largo is here to see you again," Abelyne replied quickly. "April is keeping his occupied in the foyer."

Pearl just shook her head to herself. "I don't see why Father never had him replaced with someone who has a functional brain," she groused. "I'd be surprised if he knows how to wipe his own ass without having to ask for help."

"He's a good man, Pearl," Coral sighed as she moved to set the goblet down on the cart before starting to cross the room. "A little needy, yes, but he's quite loyal. Try not to hurt D this time, okay?" she called out in an edged tone as she hovered in the doorway, one hand reaching out to caress Abelyne's neck. "I'll be back shortly."

"Sure, sis," Pearl replied in a hollow tone. She waited until the door creaked shut before shaking her head to herself. "They just don't make puppets like they used to," she sighed, casting a wry glance at D. "So now it's just you and me again, just like last night. Shall we pick up where we left off, then? Go on, entertain me," she said with a faint sneer.

"In another time and place, I might consider it," D spoke up, giving her a neutral look that effectively erased her expression. "However, I'm starting to get the impression that you wouldn't know what to do with me." He did his best to ignore the very subtle wiggling sensation in his left hand as he found himself almost nose-to-nose with a very icy pair of aqua-blue eyes.

"Oh, and what have we here?" she breathed very quietly in a glacial tone. "More insults, hunter? I would have thought that you would have figured out by now just how bad an idea it is to try to insult me like that, but perhaps you need a refresher after your nap..."

She scowled as D lifted his head up to frown at her. It wasn't a broad or obvious gesture, just a faint curling of the very edges of his lips. "Don't you get tired of the anger, Pearl?" he inquired softly, seeming to study her intently. He blinked once as she reached down to grab his crotch in an iron grip, squeezing both his manhood and his testicles as she leaned even closer towards him.

"You know nothing of me, hunter," she whispered as she started to tighten her grip. "I don't know why you keep thinking you do, but unless you want to be singing in a very high pitch for the rest of your life, or what little of it you will have left when I'm done with you, I suggest you hold your tongue."

D did his best to remain stoic and composed despite the very uncomfortable sensation he was experiencing. "Who hurt you that badly, Pearl?" he asked in a low and measured tone. "Who was it that hurt you enough to blind you with rage and leave you angry at the rest of the world? You say I don't understand you, but compared to me you know nothing of anger."

He remained silent as the dark fury returned to her eyes, igniting them with crimson highlights and causing her whole body to tremble as she struggled to keep a grasp on her temper. Her hand continued to maintain a very tight and painful grip on his groin, making it surprisingly difficult for him to breathe properly. Her lips very slowly pulled back as she continued to fight against her dark anger, allowing him a glimpse of her vampiric fangs.

"You. Know. Nothing," she said very slowly and distinctly, her voice all but masked by the way her teeth were grinding together.

"I was a century younger than you are now when they came for me," D said in a muted tone. "Vampire insurgents who sought to strike at my father through me, just as they had done with my mother. I was able to kill the three who slipped past the palace defenses and confronted me in the hallway. Once I had healed, I left the palace on my own to pursue those who were attacking us, a decision made in anger. I killed three more before they learned of my presence among them and they scattered to the winds. Still angry, I began to hunt them down, one by one.

"The anger stayed with me for years before burning out," he continued in an empty monotone. "I still pursued them, eventually widening my hunt when I came to understand how vampires viewed the humans living in their domains. To them they were nothing more than cattle to feed on or slaughter on a whim, mere tools that were to be used and cast aside at the end. Nobody stood up for the humans or spoke out against the vampire lords, not a single vampire or dunpeal. I found that I could not let that pass, that I could not dishonor the memory of my mother by letting her kind be reduced to something less than human."

"And so you decided to kill us all?" Pearl growled in a soft tone.

"Not all," D replied quietly, his eyes never leaving hers. "Only to those who willfully bring harm and misery and suffering to humans."

"And let me guess," Pearl sneered, "Nobody measured up to your high and mighty expectations?"

"No," he said softly, almost sadly. "In the days following the attacks on the palace, I was too angry to care. I simply wanted vengeance and justice. As time went on and I travelled around the planet, the fires of anger and hate inside me cooled. I realized then what needed to be done, and for me to be able to do that I had to set aside that hate so I could focus properly. Rage blinds the mind, Pearl, and unless I could see what I was doing I knew it would get me killed in short order. But when I cast aside my anger... I ended up making a terrible mistake."

Pearl narrowed her eyes slightly as D suddenly trailed off, his own eyes seeming to lose some of their focus for a number of moments. "What mistake?" she prompted in a faintly-edged tone.

He blinked and refocused, looking up at her with an unreadable expression. "I'd like to make you a deal," he said calmly. "I'll tell you about that part of my past, about the mistake I made that took the rest of my life to correct, but first I need you to let go of me and open the tunnel cover beneath me."

"Why?" she demanded in an openly suspicious tone, giving his manhood an overt warning squeeze.

"I haven't urinated in two days," D replied in a perfectly calm tone. "My bladder can't hold out for any longer and I figured that you wouldn't want me to piss on you or otherwise stink up your dungeon with the smell."

Pearl blinked and cast a reflexive glance down at her hand, making note of the way she was holding him and where it would all go if he suddenly let loose without further warning. "You wouldn't dare," she said in an ominous tone.

"Try me," D said simply, giving her a somewhat stern look. "The humans have a saying... when you have to go, you have to go."

She gave him a level look in uneasy silence before she made a very faint snarling noise to herself and released her hold on him. "Very well, hunter," she said as she absently brushed her hand against her pants before striding over to the array of levers. A rather rough tug on one caused the floor to spiral open beneath D's feet, exposing the tunnel and canyon floor below that was still faintly illuminated with the last vestiges of sunset.

"Thank you," D spoke up as he promptly made use of the now-open tunnel, unable to prevent himself from making a quiet sigh of relief that any man since the dawn of Time would have been able to easily identify and relate to. The process seemed to take an unusually long time before D's bladder was finally empty, allowing him to relax a little on the inside and bringing him a small but psychologically-important feeling of relief.

A dry chuckle rose up from Pearl's throat as she waited to see if he was done. "Maybe I should be glad that I didn't kick you in the balls," she spoke up in a faintly sarcastic tone. "Do you need me to jiggle that for you, or can I close the hatch now?" she added, giving him a somewhat cruel smile as he cast a dark look out of the corner of his eye.

"I'm finished," he replied in a perfectly emotionless tone. "Thank you for your kindness."

A dark frown promptly crossed her face as she jerked hard on the lever to reseal the tunnel. "Why do you continue to insult me, hunter?" she demanded as she moved back to stand in front of him once again.

D simply raised an eyebrow at her. "I was not insulting you," he replied in an even tone. "I am actually quite grateful for the gesture. We both know you didn't need to do that, though it would have been unpleasant had you not done so. Even the smallest of gestures of kindness deserve to be acknowledged and thanked as a point of honor," he added as he closed his eyes.

"I'm sure," she replied dryly as she crossed her arms over her chest.

D sighed very softly to himself before taking a breath to speak. "As I had said earlier, I made a serious mistake when I cast aside my anger," he said in a low but measured tone. "I tried to subdue all emotion, the better to keep myself in a rational state of mind and not be provoked to reacting to whatever was happening around me. Perhaps that might have worked had I been a noble, but I'm half-human with human emotions. Suppressing them isn't as easy as you would think, as it is the strength of their emotions that makes humans so... human," he said softly.

"I eventually shut them out completely, ignoring the emotional impulses and chaotic thoughts as I continued my hunt for those vampires who had attacked the palace. I existed that way for the longest time, though I can't say it was truly living, a quiet and often tortured existence dedicated to a single goal. I was... nothing, merely a breathing automaton who hunted vampires wherever they hid as they spread their dark misery to humankind. Many humans I met said I was without a soul, that I had forsaken my mother's blood just as much as I had forsaken my father's. I had not intended to do so, but I learned too late that I couldn't deny a part of me without denying the whole of me.

"It wasn't until recently that I was reawakened to what I truly was... not just a vampire-hunter who happened to be a dunpeal, but one who was given life by a human woman and thus possessing both her human soul and her human spirit. I didn't so much learn as remember what it was like to be human again. Not just to laugh at humor, to appreciate beauty, and to find warmth in others, but to be free of things like hate and unjust anger. I learned what it was like to be loved by a human again, and in doing so I learned what it was like to love one for myself.

"'It's part of being human,' she said to me. 'It helps comfort us in a time of need. It reminds us that we're alive, that we haven't lost our hold on our humanity like so many of those creatures out there. We know we have needs they don't, needs they can never have. The need to touch and be touched, to hold and be held, to love and be loved. A need to make love, to take and be taken.' I had my mother's love as a child, but it wasn't until recently that I came to know and understand the other kinds of love that existed and the ways that it could be expressed and shared."

He fell silent as she reached out to him, her hand very lightly touching his jaw and tilting his head up so that their eyes could meet. He wasn't at all surprised to see that the dark highlights of her vampiric side were gone, replaced by a largely unreadable look in her aqua-blue eyes.

"So let me get this right," she finally said. "You got pissed off when they tried to kill you, so you started killing them in retaliation. That I can understand perfectly, but then you... what, simply quit caring or something?"

"I let my anger and hatred go in the wrong way," D replied quietly. "I let go of all of my human emotions, both good and bad. In essence, I cast away my humanity. All that I held onto was my honor, always doing what was right because there was no other alternative for me. I knew that if I lost my honor, then I would have thrown everything away only to end up just as uncaring as the rest of them. I still cared for the humans, but in the wrong way. I saw them through the lens of a stranger, not as one of their own."

"You're a dunpeal, D," she pointed out, still holding his chin up. "You aren't one of them."

"No, I'm not," D agreed, causing her to blink with surprise. "I'm no more human than I am a vampire, and that is how it was for most of my adult life. But I finally learned that just because I was half-human doesn't mean that I can't feel like they do. The human emotions within me are just as strong as the ones in any other human's heart. And just as strong as the human emotions that burn within your own heart, Pearl. Your only problem, if you can call it that, is that nobody ever taught you what those emotions are, or what they can do for you."

Pearl narrowed her eyes as the briefest flickers of crimson flashed in their depths. "I don't need weak human emotions," she said flatly.

"Perhaps," D replied softly, "But the human part of you yearns for them nonetheless. That was a pain that remained with me for most of my life, a need inside that I didn't know how to cope with or satisfy. I learned to ignore it as best I could, but as I learned the hard way you can't deny part of yourself without denying everything else. I know it hurts you to admit it, and believe me when I say I wish there was something I could do for you in that regard, but neither of us can change the tragic circumstances of your birth."

He narrowed his eyes slightly as her grip changed without warning, sliding down to grab the base of his throat in a firm grip that started to put a mild amount of pressure on his carotid arteries. "Do not speak to me of that," she snarled in a low tone, a faint glow infusing itself into her corneas. "I am nothing like that weak human that conceived me and gave birth to Coral."

"When was the last time someone told you that they loved you?" D asked in as calm a voice as he could manage. The pressure on his throat was starting to make his pulse pound in his head, making it somewhat difficult to focus.

Pearl's lips pulled back in a snarl, baring her vampiric fangs. "I don't need such pathetic human assurances," she spat.

"Maybe not," D allowed cautiously. "But it makes you angry to see others sharing in it, doesn't it? How did you feel when you saw Elora holding her newborn daughter? And what of your father's feelings for your step-mother, Lady Valentina Winters?"

The world suddenly took on a dangerously gray cast as her grip tightened hard enough to restrict both his trachea and the arteries in his throat. A truly frightening rage sprang into Pearl's eyes, giving her visage a hellish cast as she seemed ready to tear his throat out with her fangs.

"That woman is NOT my step-mother!" she yelled at him, the veins on her forehead starting to bulge from sheer blood pressure. "You DARE try to..."

D wasn't quite sure what happened after that given the way his senses were blurring out because of the lack of air in his lungs, but things suddenly made sense again a few moments later once the crushing pressure was removed. Much to his surprise he discovered that Pearl had withdrawn on her own, a look of truly unholy rage burning in her eyes as her whole body was wracked with small spasms. He did his best not to rasp as he inhaled, greedily sucking in cool air to try to ease the burning in his chest.

"I will say this much," she rasped in a harsh tone, seeming to be barely able to keep her rage under control. "You did us a favor by killing her, and I assure you that only my father stopped to say a prayer for her soul. But do not speak to me of that woman ever again."

"How did she hurt you, Pearl?" D asked very softly and carefully, knowing he had found another source of her unholy anger and that he had to tread very carefully with her. "I told you what the insurgent vampires did to me by what they did to my mother. Tell me what she did to you that hurt you so badly."

"What's it to you, hunter?" she shot back, gritting her teeth once more. "Is it not enough that you insult me? Must you mock me even further? Would you have me hold you as my sister did and slit my throat open for you so you can drink my pain all the easier?"

It took D a moment to decide how best to reply to her, knowing that not just what he said but how it was also delivered would be of equal importance. "You say I don't know you," he spoke up quietly. "So tell me who and what you are, then. You already told me about your birth, and I already told you that I am saddened to hear of it, but do you think I hold you in contempt for it? That I hold your birth against you when you had nothing to do with it, no sort of control over it? The actions of others can't change who you are, Pearl, only you can do that through your own conscious choices.

"And as for holding you... let me tell you what the village elder told me once," he said, prompting a startled blink from her. "He said to me, 'I know that one day you may change your mind about our kind and think differently than how you do now. That is normal and expected, for all people change over time. All that I will ask of you is this... if you will not hold us in your heart, then at least do us no wrong and bring us no harm, as our lives are but a small measure compared to yours but can be burdened with just as much and with less time in which to cope with them. Give us this much peace, as we have never brought as much harm to your kind as they have done to us.'

"If you cast aside your contempt for humans and do not harm them from this moment forward," D said as he looked squarely at her, "Then I can embrace you like the sister I never had. If you not just acknowledge the human heart and soul that exists within you but open them both to others, to learn to live and love as they do, then I can embrace you as the lover Coral seeks in me. I do not want your death, or Coral's, or anyone else's, but I will fight to protect the humans from those who knowingly and willfully harm them for their own evil and selfish reasons. It really is that simple, Pearl. It always has been. I just never found another vampire or dunpeal who was willing to agree not to do any further harm to humans. You don't have to love them, you don't even have to like them or deal with them. You just can't hurt them or make them suffer any more than life has already hurt them and made them suffer."

"What do they know of pain and suffering?" Pearl whispered, her eyes once again restored to their usual aqua-blue hue. "They live a century at most and that's it. What do they know of true pain?"

"So tell me," D replied quietly. "Tell me what Valentina Winters did to you that made you hate her so, not just her but all of life itself."

The crimson glow of rage returned to her eyes for a moment before it began to fade like the last flickers of a dying ember. It seemed a minor eternity passed before her petite chest finally expanded with a deep breath. "Like my so-called mother," she said in a dangerously quiet tone, "Baroness Winters did absolutely nothing. She viewed Coral and I as commoners, no better than the human slaves she kept for herself. She didn't dare order us around as such, as my father wouldn't permit it despite his... feelings... for her, but she did absolutely nothing for us. She moved heaven and earth for her own children, giving them what they wanted, but nothing for Coral or myself."

D nodded slowly in understanding, figuring that had been the case. "And what of the others?" he asked carefully. "The children your father had with her during their marriage."

Pearl simply shook her head in disgust. "Bastards," she spat. "Every single one of them. Rose was the only one who would talk to us, as she was just as ignored by her brothers as we were, but she still treated us like dirt beneath her oh-so-noble feet. I suppose I should thank you for killing them as well," she added bitterly. "The only thing that kept me from carrying them out into the sunlight while they slept was Coral's insistence that Father would be mad enough to kill the both of us if it ever happened."

"Why didn't you simply leave the castle?" D inquired softly. "Surely you could have once you became of age."

"And go where?" Pearl snapped, giving him a look of anger that had little to do with her usual dark rage. "We are dunpeals, D, who else would accept us? Humans? They would just as soon kill us. Other nobles? They would abuse us far worse then that woman's children ever did, not needing to pretend to be bound by taboos of blood like... like..."

D suddenly felt his blood chill as Pearl trailed off, her voice failing her for some unknown reason. Something was dangerously wrong with what she had said, suggesting that he had found the true source of her rage, but it wasn't something he could immediately pin down. Unless what she meant by taboos of blood wasn't related to vampires but instead meant...

"Pearl?" he spoke up carefully.

"Enough," she said, her tone suddenly empty and devoid of emotion in an eerie echo of how his own voice was when he was withdrawn. "There is nothing more to be said, hunter. You killed not just them but my father as well. I'll not mourn for their loss, but you will still pay for my father's death. Pray that you give Coral the child she wants soon and permits you to die, as I will promise you a great deal of pain and suffering until she is finished with you."

D raised an eyebrow at her, knowing that the abrupt change in conversation meant that he indeed had gotten close enough to the mark to rattle her. "What makes you think I want to give her or anyone else a child?" he inquired archly.

"How should I know?" Pearl countered darkly. "Keep putting it to her like how you did yesterday and she'll get knocked up sooner or later, though, so you might want to start..." she said, trailing off before starting to laugh softly to herself. "Well, I was about to say start keeping it in your pants, but it looks like that's not an option right now, is it?" she said with a cruel leer.

"Believe me when I say pleasing her wasn't my idea," D pointed out. "In fact, I wasn't even asked if I was interested or otherwise given any options."

It took her a moment to react, his statement seeming to stun her into an unsettled silence. "What?" she finally said, seeming to be just as suspicious and untrusting as she was startled and uneasy. "Explain," she demanded as he gave no indication of speaking further.

"I thought I said it clearly enough," D replied in a faintly-edged tone.

"Humor me," Pearl prodded, giving him an openly suspicious look.

"I did not want to have sex with your sister," he said.

Pearl merely tilted her head at a slight angle. "Let me get this right," she said slowly. "You're trying to tell me she forced you?"

"That's right," he said simply.

"She raped you?" she breathed, a faint smile touching her lips.

He narrowed his eyes before nodding once. "That's right," he repeated.

"BULLSHIT!" she gasped as she threw her head back and laughed. It took her several seconds to calm down to the point where she could get her laughter under control and look back at him. Seeing the look in his eyes only resulted in a second burst of laughter, the somewhat coarse but hearty sound seeming to echo within the stone confines of the underground dungeon.

The laughter finally faded away, being replaced with a series of muted chuckles that seemed to leave her speechless. "A-Alright, hunter," she managed to gasp out once the worst of the spasms of humor passed. "I'll admit it, you got me. You made me laugh. That was a good one. She raped you," she chuckled before dissolving into another fit of laughs that left her gasping for breath.

"You say that like she's never done that to a prisoner bound in chains before," he pointed out in a calm tone, as if he were talking about the weather instead of his recent ordeal.

"Oh, please," Pearl said as she rolled her eyes. "She's screwed a few of the fuck-toys she brought down here for me to use as target-practice, and I'll admit I watched her once or twice from a distance, but they all begged for her touch, every single one of them. You can't force a man into something like that, they'd just deflate like balloons if they didn't want to keep it up."

"And how much experience with men do you have?" D inquired. He ignored the momentary flicker in her eyes and pressed on. "Stop and think for a moment about a lesson you yourself made all too clear earlier. The body can be made to do what the will doesn't want, and even the strongest of willpowers can be broken. It all depends on how it's done. Or to borrow your crude phrase," he added darkly, "How the right hammer is applied to crack the nut."

"You must be joking," she scoffed, giving him a smirk. The look on her face started to fade after a few moments as she stared into the dark depths of his eyes, suddenly getting the uneasy feeling that he was being quite truthful with her. "Alright, hunter," she said, no longer seeming to be amused, "Tell me how it happened."

"You're right in the sense that men are weak when it comes to sex and the pleasure that can be offered by a willing woman," D said carefully. "However, keep in mind that the body has its own instincts. You jerk back when you are burned. You cough when your lungs are irritated. You cry out when you are in significant pain."

"And you shoot your seed when inside a woman," Pearl finished for him, a dark sneer crossing her face. "But tell me how she gets it up for you if you don't want to."

D snorted very softly to himself in contempt. "As I said, the body has its own ideas and the willpower can only accomplish so much when distracted."

"Really..." she purred in a mockery of a husky tone. She cast a brief glance down at him before she leaned close, pressing herself against him as she reached down to run a fingertip across his manhood. "Somehow, hunter, I just don't believe you. But go ahead, make it hard for me," she breathed into his ear as she started stroking him. "Then tell me you don't want to take me like you took my sister. Let me hear you lie..."

"I see you really haven't dealt with men before," he pointed out in a mild tone. He waited for the flash of anger to cross her face like a stormcloud before continuing, "It doesn't work that way. I know you're just toying with me, so there's no desire or reason to think anything will happen. Coral was quite serious with her attentions last night, however, and that was rather hard to ignore. I assure you a simple touch isn't going to get you anywhere."

She frowned and edged back, casting a cautious glance down at the inert flesh she was holding. "So you say," she said in a neutral tone.

"Let me ask you this," he countered, ignoring the sudden movement in his peripheral vision. "Why would I want to do her any favors after being stabbed and tortured by the both of you?"

"To fuck her, of course," Pearl replied promptly. "Why else do men lust after women, other than to have their way with them?"

"You tell me," D stated in a low tone. "Or am I supposed to be lusting after you as well, simply because you're a woman?"

"You know what, hunter?" she purred as she stepped closer to him again, her hand working against his groin in a surprisingly gentle way as she pressed her modestly curved chest against his. "I think deep in your heart, you want me too. You just want to spread my legs and fill me with your lust like you did Coral, the same kind of lust that made you cooperate with her last night. How else could she 'force' you, hmm?" she inquired lightly.

"Why don't you ask her?" D said in a perfectly casual tone. "She's right behind you, I'm sure she'll answer your question."

In another time and place, he might have enjoyed the sudden tableau of frozen motion. Pearl blinked hard enough to be heard and quit breathing, her eyes narrowing dangerously to stare at him before casting a truly uneasy look out of the corner of her eye. She glanced back at D and was about to make a comment when she heard the faintest of coughs behind her, causing her to once again quit breathing and her expression to turn dangerously pale. It took him an incredible amount of effort to keep his face perfectly devoid of expression as Pearl slowly turned around, finding herself face-to-face with a very unhappy Baroness Coral Winters.

"Hi, sis," Pearl said in a very small voice.

"Pearl?" Coral said in a tone that was both calm and chilling at the same time. "Do I even want to ask what you're doing to him this time?"

Pearl cast a quick glance at D before shifting her focus downward to where her hand was still wrapped around his manhood. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you," she muttered as she quickly let go of him and edged away.

"Probably not," Coral admitted casually, her lips still seemingly frozen in a look of severe disapproval. "But after dealing with the village idiot, I could use a good laugh right now. Humor me," she added in a neutral tone.

Pearl sighed softly through her nose and cast a dark glance at D before shaking her head slowly. "D was trying to tell me he didn't want to screw you last night," she said in a very carefully-controlled voice.

"Please," Coral scoffed quietly. "Of course he did, why else would he have been so delightfully hard and waiting for me? Isn't that right, my dark hunter," she purred in a honeyed tone as she moved past Pearl to lean against him, reaching up with her ungloved hand to stroke his cheek.

D ignored the knowing smirk on Pearl's face and glanced down at Coral. "Actually, I didn't," he said calmly, causing Coral to blink hard. "I told you point-blank that I didn't want it. I've no desire to give you or anyone else a child, Coral, you just chose not to listen to me."

"D, how can you say that?" Coral whispered, seeming to be genuinely upset. "I know you enjoyed making love to me like that. In fact, had you came any harder you might have hurt me. That'd be interesting to explain to a doctor, wouldn't it?" she said as she turned to give Pearl a look that was just as amused as it was embarrassed.

Pearl blinked and gave her a truly dubious look, clearly unsettled with the way the conversation was going. "If you say so, sis," she replied in an absent tone, casting an uneasy glance over at D. "So I take it our 'honorable' vampire-hunter was just trying to blow smoke up my ass earlier?" she prodded, adding a hint of sarcasm to her words.

"No, he's just confused," Coral said with a gesture of dismissal. "He knows he wants to give me a child, but I think that being left out in the sun for too long earlier may have been too much. He'll heal soon enough, though, won't you, D?" she purred as she reached up to stroke his chest gently.

"You're delusional," D said calmly.

Coral paused to regard him carefully before sighing quietly. "Pearl, what did you do to him this time?" she inquired in a bored tone as she glanced over at her younger sister.

"I didn't do anything," Pearl protested, giving both D and Coral a truly disturbed and confused look. "We were just talking."

"Indeed," D spoke up before Coral could say anything. "She mentioned how strained relations were between the two of you and your father's wife," he said carefully, giving Pearl a neutral look that might have been taken as a warning.

"Oh, that bitch," Coral sighed quietly, glancing away for a few moments as she wrinkled her nose. "Val wasn't much of a mother, if you ask me, but what could we do? She was married to Father, so it wasn't like we could ignore her. Not that she really paid any attention to us either, mind you, but still."

"It's none of his business, sis," Pearl spoke up in a flat tone.

"I suppose not," Coral admitted with a soft sigh as she rested her head on D's shoulder for a few moments.

The edges of Pearl's lips tugged down in a dark frown as the gesture was noticed, glancing over at D to judge his reaction. "Do me a favor, sis," she said in a faintly edged tone. "Let me know if you want to start snuggling up to him again so I can go find something less nauseating to look at."

"Oh, listen to you," Coral fussed as she made a face. "You sure didn't mind sticking around to watch when I had Gregory down here back then."

"That was how long ago?" Pearl growled back, her cheeks taking on a faint but still noticeable pink tint. "Trust me when I say I know how it's done now, so I don't need to waste my time watching you make another mess."

"Tsk, such a prude," Coral teased with a knowing smirk.

Pearl narrowed her eyes dangerously as she tightly crossed her arms over her chest. "So sorry if I'm not as promiscuous as you are," she replied in a distinctly frosty tone.

Coral simply shrugged a shoulder in absent dismissal. "I still think you need to let your hair down every once in a while, my dear sister," she cooed in a honeyed tone. "It might loosen up a few kinks and improve your disposition in the process." She blinked and suddenly seemed to sober up, giving Pearl a faintly uneasy look. "Or was that what I interrupted into a few moments ago?"

"You've got to be kidding me," Pearl protested darkly. "I'm still quite tempted to ask April where she keeps the steel wool so I can scrub my mind of the visual of the two of you doing the horizontal tango. And knowing precisely where you've been, why would I want to screw him after he screwed you?"

"Pearl," Coral said, her tone suddenly as cold as liquid nitrogen, "Don't start with me. I can understand if you're a little jealous, as I'm still quite surprised myself that I was able to capture him, but there's no need to be so insulting."

"Jealous of what?" Pearl demanded as her eyes started to flicker with very faint crimson highlights.

D remained silent as he listened to the two sisters arguing, knowing that it was best to say out of the proverbial line-of-fire. There was something about Pearl's mannerisms that was setting off a warning flag for some reason, though it wasn't immediately obvious as to why. Granted it could have been about her temper, which seemed ready to boil over yet again, but he had the unsavory feeling that it was something far more subtle and sinister than that.

"Pearl, just be honest with me, okay?" Coral sighed quietly, giving her sister a somewhat pleading look. "I'm not going to be mad or upset if you say you're interested in him. I mean, I know I am, and I can easily see why he would appeal to you as well."

D could easily see the sudden change in Pearl's expression, almost able to feel for himself the chill of realization flooding her veins as she figured out what her sister was suggesting. "Riiiiiight," she said slowly, giving D an uneasy look. "Yeah, sure, sis, you got me. I just want to feel his manly arms around me as he makes me all aquiver with girlish delight," she said, almost literally dripping sarcasm on the floor.

"I'll think about it," Coral smiled gently, causing both D and Pearl to blink hard. "What, you don't think I'd ever share with my sister?" she added as she saw the stunned look on Pearl's face, a look at only grew more shocked as she realized that the gray-haired woman was being perfectly serious. "Oh, come now, Pearl, when have I ever been selfish like that? I mean, I've let you play with him so far, haven't I?"

"You're kidding, right?" Pearl said slowly, her cheeks taking on a faint green tint as she looked to be visibly fighting a sudden wave of nausea. She cast a quick glance at D and felt her blood grow even colder at the look on his face before he could finish recomposing himself.

"Trust me, you'll love him," Coral purred in a silken tone as she turned back to D, giving him a gentle and almost loving smile as she started to run her gloved hand up and down his chest. "Granted I'm not finished with him by any stretch of the imagination, but stop and think for a moment. You saw how big Elora's belly grew with her child, right? Surely the same will be with me, and so he certainly won't be able to please me when I'm like that. So why not allow you to make use of his services when I can't? I might even let him give you a child as well, if you ever decide to want one," she added, looking up to give D a suggestive wink.

D glanced over at her, seeing not just the playful look in her yellow eyes but the glimmer of insanity as well. He very strongly doubted his situation would last long enough to worry about Pearl giving thought to the idea, but he was hoping that Pearl was starting to become aware of the fact that her sister wasn't thinking rationally any more, or at least when it came to him.

"Coral, are you alright?" Pearl spoke up in a guarded tone, giving both D and her sister suddenly suspicious looks.

"Actually, no," Coral sighed heavily, causing Pearl to blink hard. She gave D another soft smile that chilled his blood before she turned to look at her openly uneasy sister. "Like I said, I'm still a little... breathless, I guess, from making love last night. Intense doesn't even being to describe how it felt," she whispered, seeming to shiver briefly at the memory. "Part of me wants to take him again tonight, but I think it would be best if he was allowed to rest and marshal his strength for tomorrow. He's going to need it," she added in a honeyed purr as she reached back slightly to caress his manhood in a quite unmistakable gesture.

"Why, what's tomorrow?" Pearl inquired, still giving her an openly uneasy and suspicious look.

Coral made a soft humming noise of pleasure to herself, her fingertips still toying with the sparse patch of D's pubic hair. "Remember when you asked why I took my temperature every morning?" she murmured. "It's to help me keep track of my body's cycle. And tomorrow, my dear sister? Tomorrow my body will be ready for him," she whispered huskily, giving D a coy sidelong look. "And I want him to be just as ready for me."

D turned to give Pearl a classic 'yeah, right' look before shaking his head to himself. "I don't see that happening, Coral," he said calmly. "Given my feelings on the matter, I'd take my own life before I allowed myself to be in a position to spread the taint of our blood to a new life."

"Nonsense," Coral cooed quietly as she turned her full attention to him, now using both hands to caress the curves of his muscled chest. "I've waited years for you, D, surely you can't deny me this now that I have you in my life. I promised I wouldn't hurt you, didn't I? You won't have to worry about being killed, hunter," she said, her voice turning honeyed and sultry as she leaned in to kiss him.

Pearl remained perfectly silent and motionless as she watched D twist his head away, seeking to escape Coral's kiss. The battle became futile as Coral brought her hands up to hold his head in place, keeping him steady while her lips gently worked against his for a number of moments. The whole scene was enough to truly disturb Pearl, causing her to wonder just what the hell was wrong with her sister all of a sudden. Surely she could tell that he wasn't joking about not wanting to sleep with her again or make her pregnant? After all, if he hunted their kind for vengeance, why would he want to have a vampire child of his own?

"Hey, sis?" Pearl found herself saying in a hollow tone. "I thought you said I could kill him later."

"I said if it ever came to the point where we had to kill him," Coral said calmly without turning around, her eyes still studying D with eerie tenderness. "Like I said, dear sister, don't hold your breath. It would be such a shame to have to hurt a man like him. A man, and soon to be a father..." she purred, more to herself than to either Pearl or D.

D looked over at Pearl, their eyes locking in uneasy silence for a number of moments. He could tell that Coral's words were bothering her just as much as it was him, though he couldn't discern if that would change anything. She continued to stare back at him before she let her gaze drift slightly downward, first to her sister's gloved hand and then to what that hand was gently rubbing and massaging.

She glanced back up at him and narrowed her eyes, almost as if she were daring him to react to Coral's intimate touch. A faint chill crept down her spine as D continued to look at her with an unreadable expression, apparently not interested in passion at the moment given the way his body failed to react.

A faint footstep behind her caused her to whip around, the sudden surge of tension and anxiety draining away as she saw April very timidly standing in the open doorway holding a large wooden goblet in both hands. "M-Mistress?" she called out in a meek voice, seeming to be afraid to intrude into the dungeon or otherwise disturb the pair of dunpeal sisters.

"Mmmm?" Coral hummed as she peered over her shoulder, briefly pausing her tender ministrations. "Oh, yes, thank you so much, April," she said as she saw the steaming cup her slave was holding. "I completely forgot about that."

April cast a very hesitant look over at Pearl, seeming to quail slightly as she got a dark glare in return before she quickly carried the goblet over to where Coral was standing. "I just took it off the stove," she whispered in a shaky tone, holding it out to the silvery-gray-haired woman. "It might still be too hot to drink."

"Better too hot than too cold," Coral mused as she let go of D and turned around to accept the heavy wooden goblet. She paused to take a quick whiff of the steam before smiling warmly at her slave. "Ohh, this smells good. I hope you saved some for the rest of us," she added with a twinkle in her eyes.

April quickly nodded. "The bread will be ready in a few moments and I had Abelyne set the table for you and Lady Pearl."

"You best not let the bread burn, then," Pearl spoke up in a flat tone, casting a dark glare at the suddenly-cowering woman.

"O-Of course not, mistress," April replied. She cast a brief glance at both D and Coral before making a hasty curtsy. "I'll see to it right away," she blurted out before rapidly exiting the room, leaving the door open in the same position she had found it.

"Pearl, you shouldn't be so mean to her," Coral said casually as she very lightly blew on the steaming cup, seeking to cool it slightly. "April's a good girl and she very rarely makes a mistake when it comes to cooking. Honestly, when was the last time she burned anything? When she didn't let Abby help her out," she amended quickly with a faint blush.

Pearl frowned and was about to reply when she caught a whiff of the heavy scent in the air. "Wait, what's that smell?" she inquired, cautiously taking a deeper sniff. She blinked as her mouth promptly started to water, realizing that the aroma was more than a little tantalizing.

"Just some beef broth I asked her to bring me," Coral replied, still very lightly blowing on the cup. "She spent most of the evening working on some sort of roast and I asked her to save some of the broth for D. You're probably hungry by now, aren't you?" she added as she glanced over at D, swirling the contents of the goblet around to speed up the cooling process.

"Thank you for your concern, but I'll pass," D replied calmly, trying to ignore the way his stomach was suddenly twitching at the smell of the broth. It would have been a lie to say that it wasn't making him hungry, but he wasn't about to put himself in a position of having to be fed by Coral if he could avoid it.

"Come now, D," Coral purred in the honeyed tone that D had come to dread hearing from her, knowing what her controlling influence could do. "My darling little April worked so hard on this, surely you don't want to insult her by refusing to at least sample it? Granted it is still just a little too warm," she admitted with a faint look of surprise down at the cup, watching the cloud of steam continue to waft up with enthusiasm, "But it will cool down enough to be savored safely in another minute or two."

"It smells good," Pearl observed, casting an almost wistful glance towards the dungeon exit and the stairs that would take her back upstairs to where the dining room was.

"It does," Coral agreed. She glanced down at the cup and brought it up to her lips for a very cautious sip, wincing slightly as she realized that it was still quite hot. "Mmm. Tastes wonderful, too, though she obviously wasn't kidding about taking it off the stove before bringing it down here. You should go on ahead, I'll be up in a few minutes."

"Pearl," D spoke up quietly, drawing slightly startled looks from both sisters. "I'd like to continue our talk later, if you wish, but there are a few questions I'd like to ask Coral first. Rest assured I'll be here when you are finished with dinner," he added, giving her just the faintest looks of dry and sarcastic humor.

"No doubt that you will, hunter," Pearl replied in a perfectly neutral tone. She cast a quick glance at Coral and the goblet in her hands before she snorted softly to herself in contempt. "Try not to make a mess," she added in an unreadable tone before she turned and left the room, her footsteps sounding unusually heavy to D's sensitive hearing.

"Should I ask what you two were talking about?" Coral inquired as she took a second quick sip of the heated broth, wincing as it came dangerously close to scalding her tongue once again.

"What our mothers were like," D replied, giving her an unreadable look.

"Mmm," Coral said in a noncommittal tone. "That must've been a one-sided conversation, then, as neither of us remember her for ourselves."

"So what happened to her?" he asked gently.

A sudden veil of guarded emotions seemed to pass over her face as she gave him a measured look before glancing away. "She was eight-months pregnant with Pearl when she had an accident," she murmured. "Her neck was broken, but that happens when one tumbles down two flights of stairs. Father was able to save Pearl from death somehow, though he never answered me as to how exactly he did so. Well, in any case, Pearl pulled through and went on to become the lovely woman that she is today, though she tends to get a little moody whenever she's reminded of that little footnote of her life."

Her casual description and demeanor made D's stomach cringe slightly, just enough to blunt the edge of the ravenous hunger that had started up the instant he had caught a whiff of the beef broth. He had eaten his fill before he had embarked on his trek into the village crypts, of course, as he knew it wasn't likely that he would be able to eat anything during the journey, but that had been quite some time ago.

"What can I say, D? I don't remember her," she sighed softly, casting a somewhat glum look at the stone walls. "You would think that a four-year-old would be able to remember something about her mother, but the memories just aren't there. No matter," she said with another sigh, turning her head at the last moment to direct the outflow of air over the rim of the goblet. "Damn, how hot did she make this?" she fussed as the broth continued to steam.

"So what did your step-mother have to say about it?" D asked in a very careful tone. He figured that Coral wouldn't be nearly as explosive as Pearl would be if upset by the question, but he still wanted to tread carefully.

Coral suddenly paused in mid-motion, the goblet only a few inches away from her lips as she went to taste-test the broth again. "What did Val say?" she asked herself, her brow furrowing slightly as she tried to think about it. "Oh, yeah," she grumbled quietly as it finally clicked, taking an absent sip. "Apparently Mother was a little on the well-endowed side to begin with, no doubt what first got Father's attention, and only got bigger once she became pregnant. Val said something about how she seemed to become top-heavy and had almost killed herself during her first pregnancy doing the exact same thing. Something about how steep stairs tended to be rather unforgiving like that."

D suddenly felt his blood go cold, putting together a dark picture that made him shiver on the inside. He knew what Valentina Winters was like after confronting and killing her a number of years ago. Not so much cold as very cool and calculating, he could picture her being quite upset at the discovery of her husband impregnating a human woman, not once but twice. He could also see her trying to discreetly arrange for a fatal 'accident' to occur, one that would appear to be genuinely plausible and not draw any suspicion to her. He himself had heard of more than one tragic tale of a pregnant woman losing her balance on a staircase that had led to harm to either her or the life she was carrying inside her. Or to both...

"I'm sorry," D murmured with genuine sincerity.

"Thank you," she said quietly, looking up to give him a tender smile and a nod of understanding. "I have to admit I'm a little... upset with her, but not for dying on us. Accidents happen, and it's not her fault. But she could at least have given us the ample-chest genes she apparently had," she said with a faint chuckle, reaching up to smooth the fabric out over her chest. "I mean, I guess I'm doing okay, but Pearl tends to be a little self-conscious about her breasts not being what you would call attention-getters."

She sighed quietly as she glanced down at the broth, blowing gently on it before taking another cautious sip. "Took it long enough," she muttered as she nodded to herself in satisfaction and moved to hold the goblet up to his lips. "Here, give it a try and let me know if it's still too hot. It really is quite delicious," she added, giving him a gentle look.

He made note of the look in her eyes and was about to refuse when he felt a very faint twitch from his left hand. He narrowed his eyes as he tried to decide if it was trying to warn him of something or if it was starting to fall prey to the charming influence she could exert. "No doubt that it is," he said very carefully. "But I'm going to have to pass for the time being. Not to be disrespectful to April or her cooking, but I don't know what she made it with and I'm not about to eat anything that I might potentially be allergic to."

"Mmm," she hummed quietly to herself, lowering the goblet and casting a suddenly uneasy look inside. "I don't think she used anything exotic," she said in a faintly uncertain tone.

"Who said it had to be exotic to be an allergen?" D pointed out.

"Ouch," Coral sighed, wincing slightly. "Yes, you're right. Pearl and I managed to avoid picking up Father's allergy to carnations, but she still gets a little edgy around flowers. I'll go ask April how she made this," she added as she started to turn away.

"Coral," D spoke up, causing her to pause and turn around. "You should go ahead and eat dinner while it's still warm. Just ask April to come down and talk to me for a brief moment, I'm sure knows everything she used and in what amounts."

She raised an eyebrow at his request, giving him a slightly cool look in response. "I'm not sure that's a good idea," she said after a brief pause. "The poor thing is a little on the flighty side and I don't need her getting spooked by coming down here again. Especially when no-one else is around to keep her calm," she added in a faint warning tone.

"Bring her with you when you're done, then," D replied simply.

"The broth will be cold by then," she pointed out.

"Believe me when I say that is not a driving concern," D said dryly.

A faint smile brushed her lips for a moment. "Alright," she said, making a gesture with the faintly-steaming goblet. "I'll do that, though I'll ask her to reheat this for you first. Gently reheat it," she added wryly, casting a glance down at the gauzy wisps of steam that continued to waft up. "That, and ask her why she made this so dangerously hot."

"I wouldn't worry about it," D suggested. "As you said, she appears to be a decent woman who doesn't often make a mistake. And mistakes do happen," he added carefully.

"Aye, that they do," she agreed with a faint sigh. "Oh, well, no matter. I will be back shortly, my dark hunter," she purred softly, giving him a look of casual coyness. She continued to study him for a moment before she turned away, a somewhat disturbing smile forming on her face before her back was fully turned to him. Her footsteps seemed to whisper softly as she crossed the room, standing out in contrast to Pearl's heavy steps earlier. The door was left open as she exited, the sound of her footsteps fading away a moment later.

((D?)) it whispered as softly as it could manage.

"Stay quiet," he murmured back, making a fist to keep it silent.

((Real quick,)) it replied carefully. ((The broth is fine, though heavy on the onion flavoring, and I think Pearl just got a clue as to how screwed in the head Coral is.))

"I think I can work with Pearl," D spoke softly, casting a glance over at the open doorway. "Though it will likely take more time than I have. How are you holding up against Coral's power?"

((Like I said,)) it chuckled dryly, ((You'll succumb to her feminine charms long before that power can dominate me. And yesterday doesn't count, as I felt how her metallic touch played hell with both the wiring and the plumbing. Oh, and good call with not pissing on Pearl, that probably would have gotten you killed on the spot,)) it added with another soft snicker.

"Quiet," he said softly, casting another glance towards the open doorway.

((D, if you have any ideas on how to get us out of this one, I'd feel a lot better knowing about them,)) it pointed out. ((Granted I'm keeping my eyes open for what happens, as it were, but I can't do much of anything to help if I'm kept in the dark here.))

The faintest of grunts rose up from D's chest as he closed his eyes, still keeping an ear out for any sound to indicate that someone was returning. "I'm still working on that," he admitted, his voice barely more than a whisper.

((Keep working,)) it suggested dryly. ((Oh, and speaking of working things, I'm starting to get the feeling that Pearl...))

D's breath caught in his chest as he heard a soft sound, the noise causing the symbiot to abruptly fall silent. The sound persisted for several seconds before fading away, causing him to stop and wonder just what the hell it had been. It hadn't been a footfall or the sound of movement, but rather a deep and almost metallic sound that seemed to echo faintly.

((Wind,)) it spoke up quietly. ((Blowing through the canyon and over the end of the lava tube below you. Pitch it another octave lower and we couldn't have heard it, but still. Scared the hell out of me too,)) it admitted with a sigh.

"If you were going to suggest that I try to seduce Pearl..." D started to say in a low tone before falling silent as the thing in his hand twitched.

((D, I think her loving and caring siblings did something to her,)) it said with a faint shiver. ((I mean something really bad. Maybe they messed with Coral as well, which might explain her blown mental fuses, but I think it was mostly done to Pearl.))

"Sexual abuse?" D spoke up, trying not to grimace at saying the words or the thoughts behind him.

((Think about it. Coral has issues that the others might have picked up on and tried to exploit. They start playing games, Coral discovers that she likes it and goes along not realizing that it's wrong, they try to drag Pearl into things...))

"Or Pearl stumbles across something that scars her soul," D murmured.

Humans? Pearl's voice suddenly echoed in his mind. They would just as soon kill us. Other nobles? They would abuse us far worse then that woman's children ever did, not needing to pretend to be bound by taboos of blood...

((Stumbling into things indeed. Or rather down them. Trust me, I can see a number of staircase jokes being made by her half-brothers and half-sister,)) it muttered with a dark sigh. ((And neither Coral or Pearl would know that they were being mocked. Accident my... er, well, you get the idea,)) it added in a faintly abashed tone.

"I'll ask her about it," D decided calmly as he closed his eyes. The were opened a moment later as the thing in his hand twitched violently, almost as if it was having a momentary seizure.

((D, you are kidding?)) it said. ((Push her buttons like that and she'll go apeshit again. And in case you haven't been paying close attention to what your battered and bruised body has been telling you for hours now, you simply don't have the strength to endure any more physical abuse. Sipping some of April's blood helped, definitely, but that was what, a mouthful at best? Two? Hardly enough to revive you or let you recover that much energy. Goddamn, she had the perkiest pair of nipples I've seen in years,)) it murmured softly with an almost longing sigh.

D just sighed quietly and clenched his hand into a fist, taking a small measure of satisfaction from the way the thing's sigh was transformed into a gasping grunt of surprise and discomfort. "Quiet," he said once he was sure it had fallen silent.

((Sure, D,)) it grumbled softly, its voice somewhat distorted by the way it was compressed. ((Whatever you want. Just drink the broth, okay? We both know you need the energy more than you need to score defiance points against Coral's misguided notions. Just ask for a mint when you're done, I'm not kidding about the onion content...))

D ignored it and closed his eyes, turning his focus inward to try to sort out his thoughts. It was obvious that Coral was insane and that no amount of logic or blunt refusals would change her mind. It was likely that Pearl had noticed her sister's state of denial as well, given the look on her face when Coral had brushed off his words about not wanting to give her a child. Being offered his 'services' once Coral was pregnant had also likely made Pearl stop and truly question the situation. He would have to ask her directly to find out for himself just how unsettled the aqua-eyed woman was, and no doubt risk igniting her dark rage in the process, but it was a risk he felt worth taking.

But would it be enough to help him? he found himself thinking, wondering if he really wanted to hear the answer... or find out what would happen to him if it couldn't.

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He opened his eyes and lifted his head up as they returned, able to hear their footsteps several seconds before they entered the room. He figured that Coral was in a fairly pleasant mood, judging from the soft smile on her face and the way she carried the gently-steaming goblet in her gloved hand. Pearl was obviously withdrawn, her expression a darkened mask of guarded emotions that indicated she was thinking heavily about something unpleasant.

It was the look on April's face that bothered him the most, the young girl seeming to be clearly terrified as she followed Coral's footsteps like a second shadow. Her sea-green eyes remained on his as she moved, however, her hands tightly clasped in front of her and seeming to tremble slightly. She jerked to a halt as Coral stopped, taking a hasty step back to avoid accidentally bumping into her mistress.

"Take it easy, April," Coral said in a soothing tone, reaching out with her free hand to brush her fingertips across April's cheek. The young girl remained perfectly still for the gesture, but it was obvious to D that she all she wanted to do was run screaming from Coral's gentle touch. "He just wants to know what you used to make the broth."

The rust-haired girl gave D an uneasy glance before she looked down at the floor, her lips starting to tremble as they parted. "I used a beef roast for the base," she whispered. "It was simmered in a mixture of onions, bay leaves, cloves, thyme, parsley, and peppercorn."

D nodded gently. "Nothing harmful, then," he said. He waited for her to glance up at him before he added, "I apologize for refusing it earlier, but I wanted to make sure I wouldn't have an allergic reaction to it."

"It was good, April," Coral assured her with a gentle smile. "You should head back upstairs now, if only to keep Abelyne from making a mess with the dishes. I'm sure D will enjoy it as much as we did," she added, giving D a small smile.

"Yes, mistress," April said, giving her a quick curtsy before making a rapid exit.

"APRIL!" Pearl suddenly called out, causing Coral to flinch slightly from surprise and the sheer volume of her sister's voice.

"M-Mistress?" April whimpered as she promptly reappeared in the doorway, her face turning dangerously pale.

"Close the door," Pearl instructed in a level tone.

"Yes, mistress," April replied, giving her another quick curtsy before disappearing from sight again. The dungeon door was promptly eased into the closed position, the hinges protesting softly before the door clicked shut.

"Must you have yelled like that?" Coral spoke up, absently rubbing the rim of her ear.

"Whatever, sis," Pearl muttered darkly as she leaned back against the wall and crossed her arms tightly over her chest.

Coral raised an eyebrow at the brusque response. "You're in a mood all of a sudden," she pointed out. "Don't tell me that you had a problem with what April cooked for us. That honey-butter she made to go with the bread was quite delicious, and I know you like beef to be slightly undercooked."

Pearl cast a dark glare at her sister. "Dinner was fine, sis, honest."

"So why the stormy look?" Coral inquired archly.

"Gas cramp," Pearl replied, causing the other woman to blink hard.

"Ah, yes, that... would put a girl in a mood," Coral said in a delicate tone, casting a faintly apologetic look towards D. "Okay, umm... just don't do anything... combustible, okay?" she added, giving Pearl a sheepish look as a moderate blush started to creep up across cheeks. "The torches are still lit and all, and you know how dangerous fire can be..."

"Right, sis" Pearl muttered, giving her a dour look before turning her focus on D and seeming to withdraw even more.

"I'm just saying," Coral insisted in a fairly light and delicate tone before she likewise turned her attention to D. "Anyway, here you go, D," she said as she stepped over to him, bringing the warm goblet up to his lips. "I told you she didn't use anything exotic or dangerous," she murmured.

D studied the look in her pale yellow eyes for several moments before very softly sighing to himself and taking a measured sip of the beef broth. It was quickly made obvious that the thing hadn't been joking about the level of onion flavoring, seeming to tickle his sinuses as he swallowed. The broth was quite warm though not dangerously so, making it easy for him to drink without worry about any internal damage being done. He couldn't taste anything other than what April had said was in there, finding the very subtle aftertaste of the cloves to be quite pleasing.

He drained the goblet of the broth at a moderate pace, not wanting to gulp or otherwise rush the process but likewise not wanting it to last any longer than absolutely necessary. It was easy to notice Coral's smile as he drank, a small and quiet but distinctly smug smile of victory. It wasn't enough to make him suspect that the broth had been tainted by anything, but instead merely reinforced his concerns about her intentions towards him and how she would try to dominate him in order to make him see things her way.

"Thank you," he said in an empty monotone as he tilted his head back to indicate he was finished.

"My pleasure, hunter," Coral purred softly as she leaned forward to give him a soft kiss that he decided was best to hold perfectly still for. "After all, you will need your strength soon and I certainly can't have you wimping out on me, now can I?" she breathed huskily.

He cast a quick glance at Pearl, more than a little unsettled by the stony look on her face. It was obvious that she was thinking about something, either what he had said to her or what she had witnessed for herself, but the nature of her suddenly brooding thoughts was a mystery to him.

"I have a favor to ask of you," D said carefully as he looked at Coral.

"I'm listening," Coral assured him in a cool tone.

"The mud you applied yesterday seemed to work as you said it would," he explained. "I'm not sure why or how, but surely you've noticed how it helped me heal the skin bruises in a single day. I'd like to know more about it for future reference."

"Mmmm," Coral replied, the sound emerging more as a grunt than as a hum. "I'm not sure I can help you there, hunter, as I told you everything that I know about where it comes from and how it's kept hydrated. Speaking of which, we might have to make arrangements for another shipment. We're down to how many barrels now, five?" she asked, giving Pearl a questioning look.

"Four," Pearl spoke up in a flat tone. "You traded one last month to that merchant for supplies and electronic parts, remember?"

"Oh, yes, that's right," Coral murmured as she nodded her head absently. "Still, considering what we paid for the mud to begin with and what those parts were worth, I still think we got a very fair deal for them. Mmm, and I see you managed to pick up a few more bruises somehow," she added in an edged tone as she looked back at D's chest. "I wonder how that happened."

Pearl just raised an eyebrow as she noticed Coral's sidelong glance in her direction. "It's not my fault he's fragile," she observed with a faint sneer.

"I'm sure," Coral replied dryly as she glanced over at the forgotten urn that had been brought down yesterday. She moved over to peer inside, arching an eyebrow up as she saw how much remained inside. "Hmm, I think we've got enough left for another bath if you want. Certainly enough for your jaw," she added as she glanced up at his face and sighed.

D risked a quick glance over at Pearl before looking back at Coral. "It would be appreciated," he said calmly, still fully aware of the profusion of deep aches residing in most of his muscles. He didn't like having to ask her for any sort of relief or otherwise let her 'take care of him' to further her delusions, but at this point he felt his chances of escaping her dungeon would be better if he could regain as much of his energy as he could before having to make a 'do-or-die' stand.

"Very well," Coral purred, giving him a warm smile as she reached into the urn to pick up one of the forgotten brushes. She paused at how heavy it felt, poking it into the mud base a few times to test the viscosity. "Mmm, it needs to be rehydrated again. I should make you do this," she added as she cast a mild look over her shoulder at Pearl.

"Didn't you bitch about the last batch of mud I mixed up?" Pearl pointed out in a dark tone, leaning hard against the wall. "Besides, I thought you didn't want me touching your little screw-toy."

"Pearl, what am I going to do with you?" Coral grumbled as she put the brush back into the thick mud. "There's a difference between helping me give him a mud-bath and making love to him. I don't have any problem with letting you help me with the former. In fact, I'd be grateful for the help," she added in a serious tone.

"We'll see," Pearl replied before falling silent once again, giving D a distinctly uncertain and studious look.

"Anyway," Coral muttered with a brief rolling of her eyes. "I'll be right back with some rainwater to remix this," she promised as she gave D's arm a brief squeeze before heading towards the door.

D watched her go, keeping his eyes on Coral's figure before turning to look at Pearl once the baroness had left the room. "I take it something's on your mind?" he spoke up in a quiet tone.

"Astute observation, hunter," Pearl growled back, seeming to hug herself as she leaned harder on the wall.

"Your sister is quite the generous woman," D observed, making sure to keep his tone free of any emotional influences. "I know I wouldn't be able to share a woman's bed with a sibling, if I had one."

Pearl scowled and pushed herself off the wall. "Don't get your hopes up, hunter," she said in a dark tone. "I'm not interested in you like that. All I want from you are your screams of pain and suffering."

D allowed the faintest of smiles of amusement to cross his face just long enough for her to notice. "Is that all that interests you these days, Pearl? The pain and misery of others? Surely you weren't always this bitter."

"What's it to you?" she challenged in a low tone as she approached him, stopping once she was close enough to touch him. "Or am I supposed to be all hot and bothered by the thought of being able to submit to your lusts? Oh, and such an honor it would be," she continued, her voice turning sarcastic as her lips twisted into a scornful sneer. "Being able to bed the legendary D like so many other women have. Tell me, hunter, just how many women have you taken?"

D simply raised an eyebrow at her. "I don't keep a notched belt, if that is what you're getting at," he replied calmly. "I should be able to remember if given enough time, but the number is not as great as you would think."

"I'm sure it's not," she said, narrowing her eyes slightly.

"I take it sex bothers you?" he asked, instinctively tensing up on the inside in case his question set her temper off. He realized an instant later that he had hit the proverbial nail on the head, watching as her aqua irises seemed to contract slightly before abruptly dilating outwards as a fierce red glow started to infuse itself into her corneas.

Her eyes closed a moment later as they heard the sound of footsteps, her jaw remaining firmly set as Coral returned to the room with a large cup of what was likely rainwater. The gray-haired woman paused for a moment as she sensed her sister's tension before moving over to the mud urn.

"Everything alright, Pearl?" she inquired as she carefully began to pour the water into the urn. She stopped after a few moments and set the cup down, picking up the brush with her gloved hand to stir the mixture around.

"Fine, sis," Pearl replied in a flat tone, opening her eyes to give D a dark look. The red glow had left her eyes, leaving behind a pair of aqua-blue irises that remained firmly fixed on D's expression. "It's just the gas cramp being a literal pain, that's all."

"Yeech," Coral murmured. "Well, just... take it outside if you think you need to get rid of it the easy way. A little more should be enough," she added to herself as she knelt down to pick up the cup of rainwater. She poured out a small measure of the liquid before setting it down again, her gloved hand still swirling the clay-like mixture around to soften it up.

Pearl continued to glare at D before she made a soft huffing noise and glanced away, crossing her arms tightly over her chest in a gesture that struck D as more protective than it was contemptuous. "So what's the plan for the rest of the night, sis?" she spoke up in a perfectly neutral tone.

"Mmm, a good question," Coral admitted as she continued mixing. "I was thinking about cleaning out the storage room up top," she said absently. "I'm not sure how long that would take, as we probably need to sort through all that junk first, but we should be finished long before dawn. Besides, the mud needs time to dry and all after it's put on, so we'd still need to find something constructive to do in the meantime. And before you ask, I'd rather not let you play with him while it's drying," she added in a firm tone, casting a reproving glance over her shoulder.

Pearl opened her mouth to say something when she suddenly paused and gave D an appraising look. "Alright," she said slowly, her lips slowly curling into a cruel smile that immediately made D wary. "I can take the mud off once it's dry, though, right?"

"Pearl..." Coral sighed heavily in open resignation, giving her sister a truly weary look. "The whole point of the mud-bath is to help him heal the damage you did the last time you played around with him."

"Oh, don't worry, I won't leave any bruises," Pearl promised in a silken tone, giving D an openly feral look.

"Pearl..." Coral said in a warning tone.

"You can trust me, sis," Pearl assured her with a dark smile. "No whips or sharp edges, I promise."

Coral raised an eyebrow. "Uh-huh," she said slowly, pausing to glance down at the mud mixture. "Well, the mud feels to be ready. Not too thick and not too watery, either. It might be a little cold, though," she admitted as she suddenly thought about the temperature.

"He'll be alright," Pearl purred, mimicking the honeyed tone that Coral tended to use. "Won't you, hunter?" she added, giving him a coy look.

D gave her a very guarded look before slowly drawing in a breath. "No doubt that I will be," he said in an emotionless and empty monotone. "In any case, unless you used fresh glacier run-off to remix the mud, I doubt that it will be cold enough to pose a hazard. I'll let you know if things become too uncomfortable for me," he said, glancing over at Coral.

"Fair enough," Coral replied with a gentle smile. She paused to pick up the cup of rainwater and move it over to the storage cart to keep it out of the way before returning to the urn. "I take it you want to help me with this?" she said to Pearl as she fished both brushes out.

"Sure, why not," Pearl replied, still using an obviously fake sultry tone. She gave D a look that made him seriously wonder what she was up to all of a sudden before she moved to accept the offered brush. "So how do we do this?" she inquired in a normal tone, seeming to slip out of whatever mood she had been in moments ago.

"You can coat his back," Coral replied as she scooped up a glob of mud and moved to stand in front of D. She reached out to touch his chin, tilting his head back several degrees before very carefully applying the mud to his jaw.

"Coral?" D suddenly spoke up, causing her to pause and glance up at him. "You may wish to change into something more suited for such work," he pointed out. "Surely you remember what happened to your dress yesterday."

"Mmmmm, that's right," Coral purred softly, taking a step back and giving him a distinctly playful and coy look. She continued to study him carefully as D felt the padded surface behind him split and open up, swinging away on hinges to expose his back half. Her silence persisted until D heard the soft clicks of metal locks being engaged, keeping the padded halves locked against the metal support columns he was chained to.

"Pearl?" she murmured, keeping her eyes on D. "You want to come over here and give me a hand for a moment? D's right, I already got mud on one dress so far, I certainly don't need a second one to get dirty."

"Hm?" Pearl replied, seeming to be surprised by the request. She blinked as Coral simply gestured to the back of her dress, still giving D a warm and coy look. "Uh, sis, are you sure you...?"

"It's alright, Pearl," Coral said demurely. "He already made love to me yesterday, so it's not like it will be anything new. He can look," she added in a soft whisper, licking her lips slightly.

"Right..." Pearl said slowly, giving D a look that was both suspicious and uneasy at the same time. She tossed her brush back into the urn and moved to stand behind Coral, pausing briefly to give D another dark look of unease before reaching up to grab the zipper to Coral's dark blue dress.

D kept his face perfectly composed at the distinctive sound of a zipper being parted in a fluid motion. The fabric remained in place for a moment before Coral slowly inhaled, expanding her chest to increase the tension and force the material to move slightly. It did so with a soft whispering sound, seeming to glide across her shoulders like a ghost before sliding down her body in a gentle cascade of dark blue to leave her clad only in a matching pair of panties.

"Mmmmmmm," Coral breathed, her voice more of a moan than a hum. "Thank you, Pearl," she whispered huskily as she turned her head to the side, giving her sister a soft kiss on the cheek that briefly startled her.

"Anytime, sis," Pearl replied in a faintly uneasy tone, casting a brief glance down at Coral's now-bare shoulder before looking over at D. The edges of her lips tugged down in a slight frown as she saw that he was still focused on her instead of on Coral's bare breasts as she had expected. What? she found herself saying, her lips moving to form the word but her voice failing to work for some unknown reason.

Her frown darkened as he glanced over at Coral before closing his eyes, seeming to dismiss the visual without the slightest hint of concern. Coral didn't seem to notice or otherwise care as she took a step forward to step out of the dress that was puddled in a dark circle on the floor. Pearl's eyes narrowed again as she watched Coral reach up to tilt D's head back, letting her spread the cool mud across his bruised jaw once again.

Shaking her head to herself, she returned to the urn and grabbed her own brush, scooping out a large dollop of mud and absently splattering it against his back. Her lips curled back a moment later as the force of her motion was enough to send tiny droplets of the dark brown mud all over the place. She kept her eyes on the dark blotch she had made on his back before very slowly looking down, her lips setting into a thin and flat line as she realized that there was now a small but still visible spot of mud on her blouse.

"Pearl?" Coral inquired cautiously as she leaned to one side, suddenly aware of the stillness following a rather wet splattering sound.

"Quiet," Pearl groused as she took a step back, still looking down at the fleck of mud adorning her blouse. She paused and glanced upwards as D turned his head slightly, just enough to let him look out of the corner of his eye. He seemed to study her for a moment before he turned his head away, his face remaining perfectly impassive.

"He did warn you," Coral spoke up, the faintest of smiles brushing her lips as she carefully applied more of the mud to D's jaw.

"Thank you, sis," Pearl replied in an acidic tone as she threw the brush tip-first into the urn like a large dart. She cast a truly dark glare at D's back before she snarled softly to herself and started to undo the buttons on her blouse. She quickly stripped it off and cast it aside, leaving her clad in the same kind of form-hugging undertunic that she had been wearing yesterday. She moved to pick up the brush when she caught the faint twinkle in Coral's pale yellow eyes, causing her own to flicker slightly with dark rage. "What?" she demanded in a flat tone.

"It'll wash out," Coral assured her in a languid tone as she returned her focus to D's jaw and upper chest, very gently coating his pale skin with mud. Pearl simply snarled to herself as she retrieved the brush and started to smear it across D's back, glancing up at the back of his neck to see if he was trying to look at her again.

Time quickly passed in eerie silence, broken only by the wet sounds of the brushes scooping out more mud at irregular intervals and spreading it across his skin. D seemed to be ignoring them both as they worked while Coral was soon lost in absent thought, a soft and distinctly tender smile evident on her lips as she methodically coated her prisoner with the hydrated mud. A mask of dark emotions seemed to be permanently implanted on Pearl's face, marring her beauty with something that wasn't quite a scowl but was nonetheless nothing that could even remotely be considered pleasant.

All three of them seemed to refocus in the same instant as the door was opened, allowing a flaxen-haired girl to poke her head inside with a somewhat weary look on her face. "Coral?" she called out in a faintly apologetic tone, not seeming to be fazed in the least to see her mistress dressed in only her underwear again.

Coral blinked in surprise before sighing heavily. "Abby, please tell me that fool Largo isn't here again," she spoke up.

"I'm sorry," Abelyne said, giving her a truly saddened look as she stepped into the room to join her, appearing to be dressed in a slightly different version of the essentially-nothing outfit she had worn the day before.

"Oh, lord," Coral sighed in resignation as she gave Pearl a look that was just as weary as the one on Abelyne's face. "What could he possibly want now?" she muttered.

"A very slow and painful death," Pearl suggested calmly as she returned her focus to D's back. She paused as she saw how much she had already done and craned her neck slightly to peer over D's shoulder. "How much do you have left to do?" she asked carefully.

"I'm down to his navel," Coral replied as she tossed her brush into the urn and stepped back, quickly taking a hop forward when she realized that she was in danger of stumbling over her slave. "Abby, don't do that," she gently rebuked the young girl as she quickly scrambled out of the way, still holding the discarded dress.

"Tell you what," Pearl said, her tone becoming perfectly neutral. "You go see what the village idiot wants and start in on the storage room once you're done with him, assuming you're not going to pull his toenails out or something. I'll finish up here and come upstairs when I'm done."

Coral paused to give her a faintly uncertain look, blinking and arching her back slightly as Abelyne slid the dress up to her shoulders. "Ooooh," she purred softly before shaking her head to refocus. "Sure about that?" she asked as she gave D a somewhat distracted look. "Cleaning out the storage room isn't a high-priority or anything, just something that's on the list of stuff that needs to be done one of these days. It can wait if you..."

"I can take care of it," Pearl interrupted with a slight gesture of her brush. "It's not like he's going anywhere on us and we'll have to let it set soon enough anyway."

"True," Coral admitted, holding still as the zipper on her dress was very carefully resealed. "Mmm, you have a light touch, Abby," she cooed softly, turning to give her slave a gentle smile. She glanced back over at Pearl and D before sighing quietly. "Alright, my dear sister, he's all yours for the moment. Just don't hurt him, okay?" she added in an edged tone. "No scrapes, no bruises, no dents, nothing."

"Settle down, sis," Pearl grumbled, casting a somewhat dark look at her elder sister. "Just go see what that fool wants this time. Maybe he's trying to flirt with April and just needed some excuse to come up here and see her," she suggested with a casual shrug of a shoulder.

"Eww," Abelyne whispered softly to herself, shivering lightly.

"Eww, indeed," Coral added, wrinkling her nose in disgust at the visual. "He has to be old enough to be her grandfather."

"He looks it, too," Pearl pointed out sourly as she scooped up another glob of mud and continued to spread it across D's lower back. "Anyway, like I said, the sooner you see what the hell he wants now, the sooner he'll go away and leave us in peace. Or the sooner he'll have eternal peace if he insists on bothering us for trivial reasons," she added in an ominous tone.

Coral just shook her head and ushered Abelyne towards the door. "Lead me not to temptation, my dear sister, for I can find it myself," she sighed as she left the room with her slave in tow.

"I'm sure you can, too," Pearl muttered darkly to herself. She moved to paint another line of mud when he twisted his head slightly to glance at her out of the corner of his eye. "What?" she demanded in a flat tone, narrowing her eyes at him.

"I was simply wondering why you're being so helpful all of a sudden," he replied quietly as he turned his head back around. "Or is it simply so you can try to torture me once it dries?"

"You'll find out soon enough, hunter," Pearl promised him as she resumed her task, flicking her wrist to sharply slap the mud-coated bristles against the flesh of his backside.

"Explain to me why the pain of others pleases you so much," he said as he closed his eyes. "Surely there has to be something else that makes you feel good on the inside. Or is that all the pleasure you've ever known?" he added. He carefully twisted his head to glance at her again when she remained silent, making note of the dark look on her face as she visibly struggled to keep a firm grasp on her temper.

Her eyes slowly opened and refocused on his back before glancing up to find him looking at her. A faint crimson tint immediately flashed into her corneas as she narrowed her eyes down to mere slits. "I'm not going to play your game this time, hunter," she assured him in a flat tone.

"What game would that be, Pearl?" he inquired softly. "Trying to get to know you? To understand your pain?"

"You couldn't possibly understand me if you tried," she snarled, her hand tightening around the brush hard enough to start to warp it.

D glanced away from her and twisted his neck back around, seeming to sigh very quietly to himself. "Maybe not," he murmured. "But what harm is there in trying to do so? Or do you hate yourself that much that you don't want anyone else to try to know you as well?"

The brush was thrown into the urn hard enough to splatter the remaining mud out in a wide arc, leaving a curious spray-pattern on the ground a few inches away. "Don't even pretend you know me," she seethed as she moved around to stare into his eyes, her hands curled into fists. "You know NOTHING of me."

"I know what I see in front of me," D replied, letting his eyes move down to examine her carefully in a deliberate manner.

"What?" she demanded in a low and dangerous tone, her lips edging back to expose the tips of her vampiric fangs.

"So when was the last time anyone told you that you were beautiful?" he inquired in a somber tone, looking back up into her eyes. "Or have you never wanted anyone to look at you like that?" He continued to look at her as he felt his hand twitch gently, almost as if the parasite was shaking its head to itself in resignation.

"Oh, is that it?" she whispered as her expression turned cold. "You got to ogle at Coral for awhile, so now you want to leer at me as well? Got your nuts all warmed up seeing Abelyne prancing around like the little slut-slave that she is?"

D narrowed his eyes slightly. "Do I look excited to you?" he said simply.

The corner of her mouth twitched in a spasm before she glanced down, able to see that he wasn't aroused in the slightest. "So what do you want, hunter?" she demanded as she looked back up at his dark eyes, her own eyes blazing.

"Just an answer to my question," he replied calmly. "Nothing more."

She gazed back at him, her jaw working back and forth in a grinding motion that made D absently wonder just how much more he could coax from her before she snapped and put a true end to things. "I don't know, hunter," she finally spat. "I don't pay attention to such things. Men only compliment women like that when they want something, and we both know what that something usually turns out to be."

"Be that as it may," he said carefully, "I think you're beautiful, but I'm sure you'll construe that as a demand for something despite my intentions."

"And what would you have me believe your intentions to be?" she snarled, her eyes narrowing even further as she gave him an openly untrusting look.

"All I want to do is open your eyes, Pearl," he said softly. "Not every man you meet is a rutting boar who views women as mere sex-objects to be taken and discarded once they're satisfied. Your father may have been that way, but I assure you that I'm not."

A faint chill ran down his spine at the way her fists suddenly tightened, pulling the skin so taut over her knuckles that he thought she stood a good chance of splitting it open if she kept the pressure up for too long. "Why should I believe you?" she hissed softly, seeming to barely be able to speak. "You think I didn't see the way you looked at Coral earlier?"

"So I looked at your sister when she undressed," D countered gently. "Or should I say, when you undressed her. But isn't that what she wanted, to show me her body? Tell me she didn't do it deliberately."

"Oh, I know she did," Pearl said, nodding her head slowly. "But she's always been like that, showing off to try to get attention from others."

"So if being watched is what she wanted, why are you angry that I did so?" he inquired evenly. He waited for several moments as she remained silent, her dark expression remaining frozen in place as she looked at him. "Or are you really angry at her instead of me?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Pearl replied in a voice as cold as liquid nitrogen. "Coral is my sister, she and Father were the only true family I had. And now, thanks to you, she's all I have."

"What did they do to you, Pearl?" D asked softly, knowing he was treading on very thin ice right now. "What did the rest of your father's noble family do to you and Coral that made you hate them so?"

"Nobles," Pearl spat harshly. "There was nothing noble about them, D, not a single goddamned thing. And like that bitch of a woman that spawned them, they did absolutely nothing."

"Meaning they just stood by and watched someone else hurt you," he said. It all clicked into place an instant later at the haunted look on her face, a truly dark look that left him feeling cold on the inside in a way that he had rarely felt before. "Pearl..."

"Shut up," she said, her voice barely more than a ghost of a whisper.

"They let someone hurt you," he breathed.

"Shut... up..." she hissed.

"They brought someone in to hurt you," he murmured, his eyes never leaving hers as he could clearly see the raw pain forming in her blood-red eyes. "To hurt you for their casual amusement."

"Not another word, hunter," she warned as she slowly raised her fist, her entire arm trembling from the sheer tension and rage in her body. "One more word and I'll kill you, Coral's desire for a child be damned, I swear..."

He looked into her eyes, knowing he was right on the very edge of things. He could remain silent and let her anger bleed off on its own, or he could take that final step and confront that burning caldera directly, to either unleash it in a burst of violence that would likely kill him or finally break through the wall of isolation that he knew she had been hiding behind for most of her life now, a veil of armor that he himself was all too familiar with...

"They had someone try to rape you," he said, almost too softly to hear.

Her body convulsed once before becoming still again, save for the rigid tension in her raised fist. The glow in her eyes seemed to ignite like the core of the sun before draining away, letting him see the faint glimmers of tears forming.

"Try to?" she said very softly.

"Pearl..." he said, allowing his sickened horror to color his tone.

"No," she countered, very slowly shaking her head as her tears began to silently fall. "No, he didn't. Oh, he would have that day, but you know what, hunter? Their friend would have succeeded in raping me if it hadn't been for Coral. And do you know what she did to save me, hunter?"

Her arm fell to her side as she advanced on him, her eyes all but masked by the flood of tears welling up. She stopped barely inches away from him, leaning forward until their noses almost touched.

"Do you have any idea what Coral did to spare me from being raped?" she whispered in a broken tone. "Do you know how she saved me from being violated by that vampire's lust, from being robbed of my virginity? Coral, my sister, my only real sister... offered herself to him in my place," she said as her voice finally failed her, the tears spilling down her cheeks in earnest.

If there was one thing D absolutely hated in life above all else, it was dark moments like this. It was bad enough that vampires existed to begin with, spreading pain and misery and suffering to all around them, even to their own kind. But worst of all were the crimes inflicted against women, crimes that were knowingly and deliberately perpetrated in the most heinous fashion against the most sacred of beliefs. It was as if they were compelled to desecrate and blaspheme in the most foulest manner that which had once been revered and even worshipped as pure and holy.

"Pearl," he said softly, almost tenderly. He waited until she finally lifted her head up to look at him, her aqua-blue eyes tinted red once again. It wasn't the crimson rage of her vampiric side, but rather the duller kind of red that came from bloodshot eyes and crying. "I'm sorry," he whispered.

It took her a long time to finally draw in enough breath to speak. "Why?" she asked in a low tone, not so much tinged with anger as muted from simple emotional exhaustion.

"It's how I was taught the world should be," he said quietly. "That women were supposed to be sacred and revered with tenderness, not dehumanized and treated as pleasure toys. That's how it was in the beginning, long before the red moon came and vampires were able to crawl out from the shadows. Women had power back then, the power that naturally flowed in their veins and in harmony with the phases of the moon.

"Surely you've noticed this," he continued as she blinked in surprise. "About how the world feels when you bleed every month, when your body renews itself in the true circle of life. That has long been the birthright of every woman since the beginning, holding not just the essence of life within their bodies but the very power and foundation of creation as well. Have you never wondered why vampires feed on blood to sustain themselves, why they draw from that particular essence of life? It is because such life energies like that were once freely given by women, able to nurture and sustain life even when they were at the nadir of their own cycle and their energies had ebbed to the point of self-destruction of the womb.

"Things changed with the coming of the red moon and the destruction it brought to the world, reshaping it into the dark realm that it is now. Human civilization fell into ruin, and it is only because of that initial collapse that vampires were able to rise to prominence and enslave the surviving humans. Drunk with power, they began to betray their ancestral roots and turn against the women that they once worshipped. They took by force what was once freely given, just because they could. Such corrupted and evil ways began to spread with their blood, seeking to destroy and deny the past in order to preserve and justify their current ways.

"That is the true evil I seek to destroy, Pearl," he whispered. "All who live today who share the blood of a vampire also share in their tainted ways, their evil souls. I made an oath to myself once I realized this, not just on my mother's grave where her defiled body had been laid to rest, but on her love and memory and honor as well. I swore that I would rid the world of this evil plague, no matter what the cost. For ten thousand years this has gone on, our vampire kin not just preying on humans and making them suffer needlessly, but continuing to dishonor and defile women and their sacred role in life.

"Look at me, Pearl," he said quietly. "Look into my eyes and tell me if you see in me the kind of lust that you see in so many others. Look at me and tell me you have reason to believe I have ever been anything other than gentle with a woman, only approaching her when she wishes it and taking only what is freely offered to me. Look at me, look into my eyes and look into my soul, then tell me if you see anything at all that suggests I don't hold women in the highest regard and as the most sacred of entities in this existence of life."

She stared into the depths of his eyes for what felt like a minor eternity before her own eyes briefly closed. "You know," she whispered once they had opened again, "I'm almost ready to believe you."

"Pearl..." he started to say.

"But why do you hunt US then?" she blurted out, giving him an almost pleading look. "Why do you want to kill me and my sister?"

It took D several moments to decide how to respond. "As I said, I don't want to kill anyone. My goal is to end the evil by any means necessary, and if I have to kill to see it done, then so be it. I have yet to encounter a single noble vampire who expressed the slightest remorse for their actions, their sins against humanity. I've come to believe that there is simply no other choice than to kill them to put an end to their evil. But you and your sister are not nobles, you are dunpeals like I am. You have human blood in your veins and a human heart in your chest, one capable of human emotions. If you can turn away from your hurtful ways, Pearl, if you can put an end to the darkness in your soul on your own, then I need not do anything. Indeed, I have always hoped and some nights even prayed that I would be able to spare someone, that they would be able to end the darkness on their own and not have it ended for them in the only way I know how.

"But so far, I have found none," he continued in a flat tone, narrowing his eyes slightly. "You ask why I would kill you. It is because you are like the others, rejoicing in the pain and suffering inflicted on those around you. Perhaps that is indeed all you have known in your life, but that doesn't change anything. I can teach you about what life should be like, how it should feel, but only if you are willing to listen and learn and change. I can't change you any more than you can change me, but you can change yourself if you truly wish.

"All I am asking of you, Pearl, is to do no harm to the humans from this moment forward. I can forgive you for all that you have done to me, and I will do so gladly if you can set aside your dark rage and hunger for pain. There is more to this world than suffering, and if you open your heart to others you will find that pleasure for yourself. And I don't just mean the pleasures of the flesh," he added as he saw the dark flicker of emotion in her eyes. "There are far better things out there to be savored, the pleasure of friendship, of honor, of love."

"And what of Coral?" Pearl asked in a suddenly neutral tone, the barriers abruptly falling back into place as she stared at him. "You would have her killed too, wouldn't you?"

"Unless she can change as well, I would," D admitted calmly. "She keeps humans as slaves, mere children at that. She doesn't respect humans as they deserve to be, treating them as pets instead of equals. The yoke of vampires must be lifted from the neck of humanity once and for all, no matter what the cost," he added softly, almost regretfully.

Pearl slowly shook her head as the dark anger starting to return. "Coral is the only family I have, hunter," she whispered in a dark tone of warning. "She is the only one who has ever stood up for me. If you think I'm going to let you hurt her in any way, you're going to be in for a very... very... painful surprise," she promised ominously.

D remained silent as she whirled around and stalked out of the room, her boots echoing softly on the stone floor with each step. His eyes closed of their own accord as the door was slammed shut, creating a metallic echo that resonated in the air for what seemed like a minor eternity. A soft sigh filled the air a moment later, a truly deep sound that anyone who might have heard it would have recognized as being one of resignation and perhaps even despair.

((Umm, D?)) it asked carefully. ((Are you alright?))

"I underestimated the strength of her feelings for her sister," D murmured softly. "As long as she thinks Coral is threatened, she won't listen to me."

((Yeah, umm... something like that. Er... D?))

"Quiet."

((I still think you're reaching her,)) it spoke up. ((I mean, it's obvious why she's so protective of Coral now, not that anyone can blame her, and why she's so uptight about relationships and the like.))

"The only human elements they've had in their lives were one another," D pointed out quietly. "That might not be enough to make it possible to reach out to them further. I doubt Coral can be saved, either."

((So are you still going to try to 'save' Pearl's soul?)) it prodded. ((Or are you going to focus on putting them out of their misery?))

"I don't know," he replied honestly. "But April and Abelyne need to be freed from them, one way or another. That's all that matters now."

((Umm, D, are you alright? You sound... depressed.))

D sighed quietly and shook his head gently, trying to ignore the ghostly voices rising up from the depths of his memories to haunt him once more. "I'm simply tired of all this," he murmured. "I keep trying to tell myself that there is hope, that I don't have to kill to end the evil of our blood. We were not evil in the beginning but changed with the red moon, meaning that we once peacefully co-existed with humans."

((Times change, D,)) it spoke up quietly. ((It's been ten thousand years, that's a long time even by a vampire's standards. They've all changed, even the ancient ones who existed before the world went to hell.))

"I know," he said simply. "Which is why I think the only solution now is to purge the world of our blood. Every last drop," he added with a sigh.

((Even yours, huh?)) it sighed as well. ((Even the one who has done no evil and has fought for countless centuries to save the world?))

"Even my blood," D echoed. "We've discussed this before, so there is no need to continue to do so."

((Alright, D, I'll shut up now,)) it said with another sigh. ((But think of this one, okay? How are you going to convince Pearl that she can change her ways and put an end to the evil in her blood if you don't believe you can do it for yourself? If death is what you think you deserve, what should she expect?))

The air became perfectly still as the symbiot's voice faded away, leaving D hanging from the chains with a lot of his mind and without the right words to express the questions that not even he had the answers to.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

He wasn't sure what it was that caused him to open his eyes or how long it had been since he had done so, but several moments after his eyelids parted the door was opened to allow Pearl to return to the room. She was still dressed in just pantaloons and the dark undertunic, the thin fabric clinging to her chest to emphasize her less-than-ample curves and highlight her nipples. What caused him to become wary of her approach was the mace she was holding in her right hand, a short staff topped with a metal ball that appeared to be dotted with a series of glass-like protrusions that rose up a fraction of an inch to form shallow domes.

"So how's the mud, hunter?" she said as she stopped in front of him, her tone and manner suggesting that she had not only recovered from earlier but had completely forgotten about what had been said between them.

D allowed himself to glance down at his chest as best he could. "Dry," he said simply, returning his leery focus to both her and the weapon she carried.

"Oh, good," Pearl said, giving him a somewhat cruel smile. "Coral found a few things in the storage room that she had thought she lost, so she'll be busy fussing over them and reminiscing for hours. Which means, of course, I get to take the mud off of you," she added in a playful tone that was anything but friendly or well-intentioned.

"And how do you plan on doing that?" D inquired in a neutral tone.

"Oh, very carefully, I promise you," Pearl assured him with a light smile that was only belied by the malicious look in her eyes. "See, Coral doesn't want you to be bruised or cut or anything like that, and so I figured it's the perfect time to test out my new toy. Well, I shouldn't say new," she added as she hefted the mace and carefully tapped the glass-studded sphere against her palm. "I did break it several months ago and only recently got the right kind of replacement parts for it. Know what this is?" she said as she held it up so he could get a decent look at it.

He narrowed his eyes slightly as he examined it, knowing that there had to be a number of internal parts to it. The very bottom of the shaft seemed to have a twistable mechanism while the glass domes didn't appear to be moveable, suggesting that it was an energy weapon of some sort. Had he been able to ask the thing in his had to 'look' at it with its Astral senses he might have been able to discern what it truly was, but for the moment he was at a bit of a loss to identify it as anything other than a device intended to torture.

"I can't say that I do," he admitted calmly, keeping one eye on her and the other on the mace-like weapon. He frowned as she twisted the base of the shaft, causing the glass domes to start to take on red and blue highlights.

"It's a variation of what the humans call a cattle prod," Pearl said as she hefted the mace in one hand and gestured with the other. "Each of these nodes is given a small electrical charge that's either positive or negative. Oh, the charge itself is harmless," she said as she pressed a fingertip against a blue dome before moving to touch a red one. "But when you form a conduit so the energy can flow between them..."

His expression remained unchanged as she lightly brushed her thumb and forefinger against different-colored nodes, creating a powerful spark that caused her to jerk her hand away. "Ow, that's a little on the strong side," she muttered to herself as she carefully adjusted the dial, causing the domes to dim somewhat. A second cautious test resulted in another sharp spark and a faint hiss of pain before she nodded to herself in satisfaction. "Mmm, that's much better. We don't want to actually burn anything, now do we, hunter?" she purred as she gave him a smug look of anticipation. "Nope, nothing that'll leave a mark to upset my dear sister Coral. Shall we give it a try?"

D said nothing as she approached, tracking the movement of the energized weapon before looking up to study the look in her eyes. He kept his focus on her as she reached out, lightly tapping the mace against his chest just hard enough to crack the dried coating of mud. An electrical jolt promptly ripped through the upper half of his body, intense enough to make him wince slightly but not enough to truly hurt him.

"Oooh, I think this is going to work nicely, don't you?" Pearl purred as she gave him a chilling smile, tapping the mace an inch to the side of where the first dent-like break in the mud had been made. The blow itself was hardly felt, being largely absorbed by the mud as it fragmented, but the surge of raw energy that came with it was a different matter entirely.

D cast a dark glare at her, narrowing his eyes as her smile widened before he closed them entirely and turned his focus inward. He expected her to dial up the voltage for the next strike to get his attention, to force him to cry out or let her see his pain, but the tap that followed was essentially the same as the first two had been.

She seemed to deliberately take her time, breaking the mud apart one small section at a time using very light and precise taps of the electrified mace. Each contact produced a sharp jolt of energy that seemed to sear his nerves, the pain quickly fading away once the weapon was pulled back from his skin. He soon realized that her goal wasn't to damage his skin but to further increase the soreness of the underlying muscles, keeping him in a weakened condition.

He kept his focus inward as best he could, trying to anticipate where the next jolt would strike and doing his best to blot out the dazzling bursts of pain that followed. Time soon lost most meaning to him, or at least more so than it already did as the sparks and jolts migrated from his upper chest over to his upper back. The pain seemed easier to endure there, giving him a very minor but still gladly-accepted respite from the pain and suffering. There was very little he could do about the jerking of his muscles when they were struck, reflexive contractions caused by an overload of electrical impulses, but he knew that his energy was best saved for controlling more serious reactions.

Like that, he suddenly thought as his hip was tapped, sending the burst of energy arcing through his entire side. The spasm of his muscles wasn't what he sought to control, but rather the odd tingling sensation that the jolts were starting to produce in his groin when they got too close to his crotch. He knew it was just a simple biological response to the electrical stimulus, but now was not the time for him to be reacting to her in any way.

The sensation only got worse as she focused on his stomach, slowly and carefully breaking apart the dried mud covering. Each tap not only resulted in sparks of pain but a series of hard flexes of his abdomen that was both a pain and a tickle reflex. Hard-pressed to cope with both, he decided to focus on remaining as calm as possible while doing what he could to dampen the spasms.

"D?" she said in a faintly curious tone, causing him to open his eyes and look at her. Her head was tilted slightly as she studied his abdomen, reaching out to tap the mace against him and making note of how his muscles twitched in response. "Is something on your mind, by chance?" she inquired, glancing up to study the look in his dark eyes.

"Why do you ask?" D inquired quietly, keeping his voice neutral.

"Oh, just wondering," she said coyly as she glanced down at his manhood. "I'll be honest, you were right about me... I don't know much about men. But I think I can tell when something interests them, and if I didn't know better I'd say you were thinking about something a few moments ago."

"What makes you say that?" he prompted, ignoring the faint icy tingle that was crawling down his spine.

"Just a small twitch," she said lightly, extending a single fingertip to brush against him. "Like that," she added as she thought she saw the faintest suggestion of movement. "Well, hunter?" she prodded as he remained silent. "Are you going to tell me what's on your mind? Or do I have to apply a little pressure..." she added as she tapped the mace against his abdomen, just below his navel.

He did his best to ignore the jolt that shot through most of the nerves in his lower body and caused his now-sore abdominal muscles to spasm yet again. "I was thinking about what you said earlier," he said calmly. "About what you had to suffer through before Coral intervened."

"Oh?" she inquired in a perfectly flat tone, her eyes once again starting to take on a faint crimson highlight. "And which part interests you, hunter? Me being this close to being raped, or my sister offering herself in my place? Answer me," she demanded in a glacial tone as she jabbed him in the abdomen with the mace again and held it in place for a second.

D's whole body twitched as the energy coursed through him, sending a wave of agonizing pain shooting up and down the length of his spine. He sagged in relief once the mace was removed, allowing him to try to recover his breath. "How... how old were you?" he panted, surprised by how out-of-breath he was following the protracted jolt.

"Seventeen," she snarled softly. She paused briefly as she glanced down, her expression visibly twitching before turning even colder. "I take it that interests you?" she whispered dangerously.

It took D a moment to realize what had caused her abrupt change in mood. "Pearl," he said in a cautious tone as he immediately tried to reassert control over his anatomy that had started to react to the electrical discharge. He winced as the mace was brought up into his thigh, not hard enough to hurt or bruise anything but enough to press several of the charged nodes against a large cluster of somewhat sensitive nerves. The protracted burst of energy was enough to send his thigh muscles into a spasm of twitches, as well as further disrupting his control over his body's reflexive responses.

"Interesting," Pearl commented as she lifted the mace back up, studying the way his hardened manhood was now twitching in time with his pulse. "And all this time I thought I was wearing you down. You like pain, don't you?" she asked as she looked up at his eyes with open intrigue. "Gives you a bit of a tingle on the inside, does it?"

"Have you ever electrocuted yourself?" D rasped softly. "I don't mean a simple jolt from your mace, but been in protracted contact with a strong field of energy? Your body uses such impulses of energy to send signals and can be confused when exposed to a strong source of such electricity."

"Uh-huh," Pearl commented, still studying his groin. She reached out to very carefully run her fingers along his manhood before glancing up at him, her eyes still filled with a measure of coldness. "And how do I know you weren't thinking about me being raped, hmm? How do I know you're not thinking about it even now? Wish you were there to watch, hunter? Or would you have liked to have been the one who tried to rape me? Answer me," she demanded as her hand suddenly closed around him, gripping him hard enough to send sparks of pain shooting throughout his already-raw nervous system.

"I already told you my views of women," he said, doing his best to keep his voice as steady and even as possible. "I would never try to violate one, nor would I stand by and allow a woman to be violated if I could help it. What happened to you was wrong, Pearl, and I certainly don't want to see it happen to you or anyone else."

"But you thought about it, didn't you?" she whispered. "I know you did. You tried to imagine what it was like, didn't you? Did it excite you, hunter, thinking about a seventeen-year-old girl being held down, stripped naked, and barely seconds away from being violated by a man? He was just as hard then as you are now," she spat, tightening her grip on him. "Tell me why I shouldn't rip it off right here and now, why I shouldn't spare the world from the evil lusts of men like you..."

"PEARL!" a voice cut across the open air, causing both D and Pearl to cast startled glances towards the open doorway. Coral was standing there with a dark look on her face, holding a rather tattered crossbow in one hand and what appeared to be a flintlock pistol in the other.

Pearl cast a truly dark look at D before she released her hold on him with a soft snarl. "We're not finished with this, hunter," she promised him in a soft voice that only he could hear. "Just you wait."

"Pearl," Coral said again as she strode into the room, still scowling. "Can't I leave you alone with him anymore? What is with you?" she demanded.

"Ask him," Pearl said simply, not taking her eyes off of D. "He's the one getting all excited. I think he wants to fuck me," she added darkly.

"Or maybe you want him as well," Coral suggested flatly, causing Pearl to blink hard and whip around to stare at her.

"What?" Pearl gasped. "You're out of your mind..."

"Maybe," Coral replied, giving her sister a stern look. "But I told you once that he's mine. You finished with the mud?" she asked as she cast a quick glance over at D's body.

"I think so," Pearl said, likewise glancing over at D's body. Her gaze fell back down to his manhood, surprised to see that he was largely calmed down now but was still visibly reacting.

"Good," Coral said in a neutral tone. "I'm grateful for your help in the storage room, I mean it. Now go find something else to do for awhile."

Pearl blinked at the sudden tone of command in her sister's voice, turning back to her to find a very stern expression etched on her face. "Sis..."

"Go soak in a hot bath and have Abby wash your hair for you," Coral said absently as she turned away to set the weapons down on the storage cart. "You might even be able to get April to do it if you ask her nicely. Now go."

"Coral..." Pearl started to protest, giving her a startled look.

"Pearl?" Coral said softly, craning her neck over her shoulder to reveal the golden glow in her eyes. "Don't argue with me. Go."

Pearl blinked again and cast a dark look towards D before she spun around on her foot and stalked out of the room, holding her electric mace in a white-knuckled grip. She cast the briefest of glares out of the corner of her eye as she reached the door, exiting the room and none-too-gently closing the metal door behind her.

Coral very softly let her breath out as she braced herself against the cart for a number of moments, her neck stiff with tension. "So what did she do to you this time?" she asked in a very quiet and controlled voice.

"She told me about an incident in your childhood," D said in a very wary voice, not having the slightest clue as to how Coral would react. "About how you saved her from being raped once."

Coral immediately froze, not even seeming to breathe for several moments. "She told you about that?" she inquired in a faintly incredulous tone. "Please don't tell me that's what made you all excited..."

D snorted in contempt. "No, that was simply a biological reaction to the electric field generated by her mace," he explained in a somewhat dark tone. "I'm not the kind of person to be pleased to hear about a tragic incident such as that."

"Just checking, D," she sighed softly. "I'm... I'm actually speechless," she admitted as she stood up straight and turned to face him, her face oddly pale. "She very rarely speaks to me of that incident, and never once mentioned it to anyone else. Oh, she told Father about it... once she quit shaking, the poor thing, and Father made a rather public example out of that asshole friend of Johnathan's, but still.

"To make a long story short, D," she sighed heavily, "Our half-brothers were curious how men and women laid together, and they somehow came up with the idea of using one of their sisters as a demonstration aid. They didn't dare ask Rose, of course, and I was in the village at the time, so they turned to Pearl. They gave her a cup of wine that had been laced with a drug, carried her into the stables, tossed her on a bed of straw, and let one of their noble friends take matters from there.

"The drug would have completely incapacitated her had she been a noble, but because she was a dunpeal her human side was able to resist the effects to a degree. I heard cries of protest as I came up from the village and decided to check it not, not realizing until I got there that it was my sister. She was stark naked and spread open with that bastard Leon McKinney looming over her with his dick hanging out, and he didn't look like he was going to settle for simply putting it back in his pants.

"I was twenty-one at the time," she said, giving him a somewhat casual shrug. "I had already dispensed with my virginity a few months earlier, so it wasn't like I had much to lose. I couldn't fight him directly, as he was a full-blooded noble and I was just a dunpeal, so I made him a deal: I'd go up to the hayloft with him if he left Pearl alone. It was, quite honestly, the most disappointing five minutes of my life," she sighed. "He wasn't what you would call gentle and lost his mind after eight strokes. You should have seen the look on his face when I told him I had more satisfying gynecological exams," she added, seeming to giggle just slightly in a way that deeply disturbed D.

"In any case, he quickly got lost after that. Johnathan and Abraham very quietly left, too, but I didn't know until much later that they had been there to begin with. I helped Pearl clean up and all, then we went to see Father. Let's just say that Leon was tracked down and brought back to the castle in short order. Father gave him a chance to explain himself, then splattered the walls with his blood for abusing his daughters. Needless to say, nobody dared to lay a hand on either me, Pearl, or Rose ever again. Not that anyone really bothered Rose to begin with, but she had the hardest time finding dates for a long time afterwards," she added with a casual shrug and a soft sigh.

"That was awfully courageous and selfless of you," D spoke up, trying very hard not to shiver at the picture she had just painted for him. Bad enough vampires existed, worse still that they deliberately sexually preyed on women, but he simply couldn't fathom how one could dare to even consider having one's sister raped simply out of curiosity or entertainment.

"Not too much, actually," she said off-handedly, causing him to blink in surprise. "Granted I was a little... upset that he was forcing himself on my dear little sister, but I had to admit I had been feeling a little horny all day and figured that some opportunities shouldn't be passed up. He was kinda cute," she admitted. "But like I said, I was quite disappointed by the whole experience. It took longer for me to get undressed than for him to get his dick wet and end up spilling his seed."

D's blood suddenly chilled as she lifted her head up to look at him, her pale yellow eyes giving him an openly sultry and coy look. "Now you, my dark hunter," she purred in a honeyed tone as she started to press against him, her gloved hand reaching down to very gently stroke his now-inert manhood. "You are a far, far better lover than that bastard ever was. Would you believe I can still feel it from last night?"

"Perhaps," D said in a neutral tone, suppressing the urge to sigh in open frustration as he found himself having to fight his body's responses once more. A sudden flash of inspiration hit him as he cast a quick glance over to the pair of weapons she had brought down with her. "So what did you find when you were cleaning out your storage room?" he asked calmly, praying that she would overlook his obvious attempt at changing the subject.

"Just a few odds and ends," she purred softly, her hand still massaging him gently. "The first pistol I purchased and Pearl's antique crossbow. Mmm," she hummed softly as she closed her eyes. "You're making me horny all of a sudden..."

"I'm not doing anything," D pointed out in a flat tone.

"I can't help it if I want you," she whispered as she parted her eyelids slightly, just enough to let him see the look of lust burning in them. "I know I shouldn't let you make love to me again, since we'll both need our strength for tomorrow, but I can't get you out of my mind. You and that feeling of how hard and strong you came inside me..."

"I'm still a little sore," he said, remembering the tactic he had given consideration to using previously. It was a true statement to say that he was sore right now, as the muscles in his chest, abdomen, and back were starting to protest fiercely again after being repeatedly jolted by Pearl's mace. To say that his manhood was sore from yesterday was not nearly as accurate, but he could probably live without having to clarify that minor technicality.

"Awww," she sighed, giving him a sorrowful look. She glanced down at him and squeezed him gently before letting go. "I'm sorry, D. I'll try to be more gentle tomorrow night," she promised before leaning forward to brush her lips against his.

He would have breathed a sigh of relief if she hadn't been so close, not wanting to give her any indication of his emotional state. A dark jolt of icy electricity ran down his spine a few moments later as she suddenly deepened the kiss, the tip of her tongue deftly slipping between his lips to brush against his own. The erotic feeling caught him by complete surprise, requiring several moments of concentration recover his focus. Aha, he thought simply, finally realizing what had happened yesterday that had disrupted his self-control.

"Mmmm, D?" she suddenly purred in a husky tone as she noticed his brief reaction to her intimate kiss.

"As I told Pearl," he said calmly, "The body sometimes has its own ideas of how to react in certain situations." His breath was promptly cut off in his throat as she pressed hard against him, sealing her lips to his in a kiss that quite literally left him in a minor daze.

"I knew you wanted me," she breathed, moving her head back just enough to let her lips brush against his as she spoke. "Oh, my dark hunter... my dark love," she whispered in an even softer tone before kissing him once again.

It took several seconds for him to find a way to break the kiss, not able to move his head very far in any direction. "Coral," he rasped, trying to ease the ache in his lungs from lack of oxygen. "Now's not the time for this."

"Why not?" she countered in a honeyed tone, her pale eyes almost literally glowing with lust. "I can be real gentle, D, so gentle you will hardly know you're inside me. But we will still feel one another..."

"Coral..." he said, feeling the pit of his stomach start to churn as she pushed herself away from him and started to unlock the padded backing. He did his best not to sigh as it swung into place behind him and was locked shut with a soft metal click.

"Just relax, my love," she purred in a honeyed tone as she went over to the bank of levers and pulled the center one. She then reached behind her to unzip her dress as the gears rotated the support frame from a vertical to a horizontal plane. A simple tug on her panties caused it to join the rest of the discarded fabric on the floor at her feet, leaving her clad only in her boots and the lambskin glove on her left hand.

D cast a glance over at her as she approached, pausing only to wriggle her ankles and step out of the boots. "Coral, don't do this," he said in a hollow tone, knowing it was a futile effort but being compelled to try anyway.

"You worry too much, hunter," she chided him softly as she eased herself up onto the platform. Her ungloved hand moved up to slowly stroke his chest, her fingernails very lightly scratching him in a playful manner as she moved. Her other hand moved down to caress his manhood, brushing her gloved fingertips against him before making a cupping motion. A truly impish gleam appeared in her eyes as she gave him a soft smile before leaning forward over him.

It was one of those rare moments in his life where D knew precisely what hit him and yet didn't have the slightest clue at all. The sensation of her mouth around him was beyond words, the impulses so strong and vibrant that he didn't have the slightest prayer in a godforsaken world of being able to keep his body from responding. He felt himself swelling up like a balloon as she very tenderly teased him, both the pleasure of the feeling and the pain of his abused body melding together to create a truly unique sensation that throbbed in exquisite synch with his heartbeat.

"Easy, my dark hunter," she said softly as she started to slide her body against his, her voice sounding to be both a giggle and a purr together even as it was laced with that honeyed echo of her hypnotic influence. She trapped him in the warmth between the soft globes of her breasts for a few moments, rocking back and forth before sliding her body higher up until she was astride him.

He said nothing as she gently braced her hands against his chest, ignoring the faint twinge of pain as the pressure started to compact his ribs. It felt like they were largely healed now, but as with all such injuries they remained sensitive for some time afterwards. A faint tickling sensation returned his focus to what she was doing, feeling a haunted veil descending over his soul as she very slowly eased him inside her.

"Oohhhh, D," she breathed, absently raking her nails against his chest as she closed her eyes and leaned back. She settled her weight around him before starting to use her internal muscles, beginning a series of what felt like very gentle squeezes and tugs. It was almost like a massage given the way her grip seemed to flow back and forth a deliciously warm and fluid motion.

"How's that?" she asked softly as she closed her eyes, keeping her focus turned inwards. "Nice and gentle, just like I promised, my love..."

D found himself readily admitting that it indeed was just as gentle as she had said, absently wondering what kind of muscles women had that could be used like this. It wasn't the first time he had been made aware of the existence of such muscles, explained to him once as being quite useful during childbirth, but he could count on the fingers of one hand how many times he had encountered a woman who had such exquisite control over them and knew how to use them to the utmost effect.

He glanced up at her as her breathing began to deepen and speed up, her nipples tight enough to make him ache slightly just thinking about the amount of tension. Gently squeezing them right now would probably have resulted in a sharp surge of pleasure that tended to trigger a somewhat mild orgasm, but even if he had been inclined to do such a thing he was still very much chained down and without any mobility whatsoever.

"D?" she moaned softly, the grasping motions of her muscles seeming to be a little more frantic now as she approached her own peak of pleasure. How that worked while her hips had barely moved since he entered her was beyond him, but he was fully aware of the fact that simple willpower and raw desire could go pretty far when working in conjunction.

He blinked as he felt his own orgasm suddenly start to build. He figured it was simply another biological reflex, reacting to her own building passions and preparing to accommodate. His eyebrows arched up several seconds later as her breathing suddenly changed, resulting in a rapid increase in the sensation of his impending orgasm.

Her sheath suddenly clamped around him, squeezing him from all sides as her passion finally broke. The feeling wasn't nearly as hard as it had been the first time she took him, but it was still firm enough to produce both an instant ache and a minor eruption as his body spasmed in response. The feeling lasted for far longer than he had anticipated, leaving him stunned and utterly breathless while at the same time filling him with an unimaginable feeling of satisfaction and relief.

"Oh, yes," she whispered as she too seemed to be gasping for air. "Oh, yes, my dark hunter, come with me... oh, god, D... oh, yes, my love..." Her entire body seemed to spasm without warning, making her shiver fairly hard before she relaxed once again. "Mmmmmmm," she purred as she slowly leaned forward to rest her body's weight on his chest. "Oh, yes, that's how I love it, my dark hunter, nice and gentle like that... Mmmm..."

It took D a moderate amount of effort to keep his expression perfectly neutral, wincing on the inside as both his ribs and his chest muscles protested in earnest against being subjected to her weight. Granted she was far lighter than he was and certainly a lot lighter than that rock had been, but it was still more pressure on barely-healed bones and muscle tissue than he needed.

He cast a less-than-amused glance down as her as she shifted positions, putting most of her weight on his chest as she carefully stretched her legs out so that she was largely lying lengthwise on top of him. She then folded her arms and tucked them beneath her chin, letting her rest her head as she gazed into his eyes.

"D?" she murmured very softly to him. "You're absolutely wonderful, you know that?"

He narrowed his eyes slightly as he studied the look in her eyes, absently making note of the fact that light-colored eyes such as hers tended to be far more expressive and easier to read than dark-colored eyes like his own. The look she was giving him was one of contented satisfaction and open adoration, but he could also see a somewhat glassy aspect to her gaze that suggested she wasn't sane.

"I'd like to say I'm touched that you think so," D said in an emotionless tone, "But I didn't do anything, nor did I even want it to happen."

"Such modesty, my love," she purred softly, not seeming to be fazed in the least by his overt rejection. She carefully unfolded her right arm and moved it forward, just enough to let her fingertips lightly brush across his lips. "But I know how you really feel," she assured him with a soft smile. The smile turned playful as she squeezed her internal muscles briefly, the smile growing wider as she saw the way D blinked at the pointed reminder of their continued union. "And believe me when I say I love feeling you inside me like this."

"Be that as it may," D spoke up, "I'm going to have to ask you to move."

"Awww," she sighed, giving him a truly regretful look. "Must I?"

"It would be sincerely appreciated," he replied with absolute honesty.

"If I must," she murmured to herself as she gently eased back, just enough to let his manhood fall free from her sheath. She gently settled her weight back down on him a moment later, tickling him intimately with her pubic hair. "I still need to use you as a pillow for a few more minutes, however," she said with a longing sigh, giving him a tender look. "You're nice and warm, and you wore me out pretty well a few moments ago. Or do you not think that a girl is in need of a rest herself after such gentle love-making?" she added.

D turned his focus inwards for a brief moment, listening to the aches and pains from his ribs before deciding that he wasn't hurting badly enough to make an issue of her continued weight. "I believe it," he replied absently. He paused as a sudden flash of inspiration came to mind, causing him to twist his head slightly to the side to look at the row of control levers. "I have a question for you," he spoke up before returning his focus to her.

"I might have an answer for you," she countered as she started to lightly tap and brush her fingertips against his lips.

"Which lever controls the roof hatch?" he asked calmly, causing her to pause and blink. "Being down here for so long, I wouldn't mind having a breath of fresh air," he explained. "Seeing how you won't let me out, I figured you wouldn't object to opening the equivalent of a window for awhile."

"I'm willing to let you out, D," she protested softly, giving him a rather hurt and sorrowful look. "I just can't let you do so without promising not to do anything against me or my sister. I know you'd never harm me, not after all we've been through together, but I still need to look out for Pearl."

D looked at her in silence before glancing back towards the levers, trying not to let his expression change to reflect his thoughts on her obvious state of insanity. "So which lever is it?" he asked tonelessly.

"Far left from our current vantage point," Coral murmured. She cast a measured glance around the room before shifting her weight to the side, her right arm starting to reach out in a beckoning motion. She made a grasping gesture as her eyes suddenly lit up like magnesium flares, glowing fiercely with a vivid golden color.

D blinked as most of the hair on his body suddenly stood on end, casting a reflexive glance towards the control lever just as it started to move. The realization that she possessed the power of telekinesis, or at least a limited form of it, was a deeply bothersome one. The power to physically move external objects through force of will was largely a common one among vampires, though the range usually was limited only to objects that were in physical contact with the controller such as clothing. The ability to project that power from a distance, however, was far less common among nobles and rarer still among dunpeals. In fact, he found himself thinking, the last vampiric entity he had met with a strong power of telekinesis had been Count Magnus Lee, and that had been ages ago...

The lever finally clicked into the down position, causing the overhead hatch to spiral open. Both D and Coral blinked as they were promptly bathed in crimson radiance, a result of the near-full red moon being high up in the sky where the mirrors were able to concentrate the glow. D knew it was not often that the red moon was alone in the sky, given the way it followed an almost perfectly parallel course to the white moon like a lost puppy.

"Thank you," D said simply, focusing his attention on the reflections and scattered images inside the mirror-lined lava tube.

"The things I do for you, my dark hunter," she teased softly as she very carefully rose up on her elbows to kiss him. She then settled back down and folded her right arm under her chin once more, letting her eyes close of their own accord. They opened again a few seconds later, giving him a distinctly curious look. "D, is it just me, or does that light feel odd all of a sudden?" she inquired cautiously.

"Does it feel bad?" he inquired, already able to feel the faintest of tingles in his skin where her body wasn't blocking the tainted moonlight.

"No," she admitted before closing her eyes again. "Mmm, in fact, it feels fairly nice. Almost like how you get after a good back rub, though not nearly as good. Interesting," she added, absently pressing her groin a little harder into his with a soft sigh.

"Coral..." he started to say.

"Easy, my love," she sighed softly again, wriggling her hips slightly to tease him before becoming still. "I know neither of us has the strength for anything more tonight, but I can't help it if I want to feel you inside me a little bit more. You're just that wonderful, D," she purred softly as a truly dreamy smile crossed her lips. "And I know tomorrow will be even better..."

"We'll see," D said in a perfectly neutral tone. He ignored the soft purr of contentment he got in response and continued to study the way the light was reflected inside the lava tube. It took him a moment to realize that the tube ran fairly straight and that part of the crimson coloring overhead was a direct line of sight to the moon itself.

He narrowed his eyes slightly as he began to concentrate, extending his vampiric senses outward as best he could to focus on what he had learned was an alien intruder in the evening sky. The sounds around him began to magnify as he concentrated, the flickering and crackling of the torches lining the walls seeming to increase in volume. The sound of Coral's breathing started to echo in his ears, a soft and slightly unstable mantra that ever so slowly started to even out and relax. Twin thrums were detected next, the sound of her heartbeat and his pulsing away at steady and unceasing paces to keep the life in their veins flowing along. The faintest of trickling noises registered on his mind, perhaps water flowing through pipes somewhere, followed by the low and haunting sound of a twilight breeze flowing through the canyon. And finally...

There, he thought as he closed his eyes, not so much able to hear the odd sound as feel it. It was pitched at the bottom edge of the scale, almost too low for even his vampiric hearing to detect and certainly well beyond the range of human hearing. He had come to refer to it as the call of the moon, a dark and somewhat ominous sound akin to resonance that was very rarely audible. The last time he could remember hearing it clearly was during a rare alignment of both moons on the horizon when they were full, the deep harmonic seeming to be magnified by the gravity of the white moon.

The harmonic seemed to change pitch without warning, prompting him to open his eyes and glance up at the sky as seen through the mirrored lava tube. He narrowed his eyes as a small white spark came into focus, drifting through the darkened sky on what appeared to be a collision course with the red moon. The very edges of the moon seemed to waver before becoming solid again, revealed to be a simple illusionary effect from the atmosphere as the spark continued on its journey, now cast as a distinct shape against the backdrop of the moon.

"D?" Coral spoke up very softly, causing his eyes to drop down to hers. The yellow expanse of her eyes were filled with curiosity and concern, seeming to be genuinely interested in what he was studying. "Is something wrong?"

"The City of the Night is passing overhead," D pointed out quietly as he made the slightest of motions with his chin towards the open roof hatch.

Coral blinked and twisted her neck around before pausing. She glanced up at him before very carefully rolling over onto her back, keeping most of her weight on her arms and legs as she completed the movement. She laid back down on top of him, spreading her limbs wide to cover his and resting the backs of her hands in his palms. "Ohhhh," she breathed softly once she laid her head back against his shoulder and refocused on the ceiling. "I see it! D, are you sure it's the City and not some random satellite?"

D cast a truly disgruntled look down at her, his breath momentarily caught in his throat from the sudden burst of pain caused by her movements. The flare of pain in his chest had largely settled down after a few moments, but the rest of his muscles were still heartily protesting the continued presence of her body's weight in several locations. "Look at the shape," he said simply as he returned his focus up to the darkened heavens.

"Amazing," Coral whispered in awe as they both watched the spark of light take its time crossing the broad expanse of the moon. "Have you ever been up there before?" she asked.

"No," D replied as the whispering voices suddenly returned to haunt his conscious mind. The City of the Night was a massive space-station, built well after the arrival of the red moon into orbit but thousands of years before the Blood Wars. It had originally been part of a grand plan of domination, where vampires could rule the world from the sanctity of heavens themselves and not need to bother with the 'filth' of lesser beings like humans and mutants. The station had no windows, and so its denizens need not worry about exposure to a sun that could no longer rise or set unless the station was eclipsed by either the planet or one of the two moons.

Folly, said the calm though now-raspy voice of the eldest during the one council meeting D had been allowed to attend. You would have us forsake the world we have known for all these millennia, the very earth we came from and sustain ourselves with, and for what? A metal bubble in the void of space?

Look around you, Elaine, the other voice countered. The world is dying. We must leave it while we still can. Let the filth scrabble in the dirt, all that needs to be done is harvest the fruit once it becomes ripe. We are lord and master of the humans, should we not rule from above where we can watch over them like the gods that we are?

Let the dogs cower in their tin kennel! the voice of his father raged the night D left the castle. If they think the City is beyond my reach, then they shall be taught otherwise! I will crush their little haven if I must, and the City of the Night reduced to a cloud of stardust!

Come on, Leila whispered softly, watching intently as the spark of light rose up from the crumbling remains of Castle Chaythe, carrying Meier Link and the body of Charlotte up to what they had sacrificed everything for. The sound of the shuttle engines was not encouraging, however, seeming to rumble and gasp in a very unsteady mantra. Fly... FLY!

"D?" Coral murmured very softly, drawing him out of the dark cauldron of haunted memories. "I know this may be a bit much to ask right now, but would you consider marrying me once our child is born?" she said, closing her eyes and rubbing the back of her hands against his motionless palms. "A marriage of blood, of course, not that silly bonding ritual humans have."

The only thing that kept him from shaking his head in both disbelief and resignation was the simple fact that her head was wedged between his cheek and his shoulder, leaving him no real room to move. "You're right, it is a bit much to ask right now," he pointed out calmly. "I would even go so far as to remind you of a human expression: Don't count your chickens before they've hatched."

"I know, D," she replied with a soft murmur, stretching lightly to capture his fingers between hers and intertwining them gently. "But I can't help it, thinking about what our future together is going to be like. Would you at least think about it? Please?" she added softly.

D cast a sidelong glance at the way her gloved hand was holding his own, grateful for the fact that she hadn't taken the glove off given the way her hand was pressed against his. He had only been in physical contact with her metal implant for a few seconds, but that had been more than enough to bring him under her hypnotic sway for a short period of time. Had the metal been exposed, it would have been solidly pressed against the parasite in his hand and likely driving it up the proverbial wall.

He sighed quietly to himself and returned his focus to the overhead view, catching the briefest of glimpses of the reflecting spark that was the City of the Night before it passed out of his line of sight. "I'll give it the proper consideration it deserves," he said in a hollow tone.

"Thank you, my love," she whispered in reply, seeming to be relieved to hear him say that. "Mmm, this is making me tingle all over. I've never been one for overly casual nudity, but lying in the moonlight with you like this is making me feel... warm and comforted."

"Glad I could help," D said absently, more than a little disgruntled about the fact that she was blocking most of the crimson moonlight from reaching his skin. He was almost positive now that the red moon's light had a rejuvenating effect on vampires, more so when it was isolated or otherwise undiluted by the more vibrant radiance of the white moon. Was this the reason vampires had been able to emerge from the abyss? he found himself thinking.

"You have no idea, my dark hunter," she purred softly as she brought her arms up to stretch, seeming to be reaching for the moon. She paused for a few moments before reaching up with her right hand, tugging off the lambskin glove and casually tossing it over in the direction of her discarded dress to leave her totally bared to the moonlight.

An icy chill flooded D's veins as she looked like she was going to rest her hand against his again, but she merely continued to stretch before absently folding her left hand over her right breast as her right hand came to rest at the very top of her pelvis. The result was a distinctly relaxed pose that one could easily call a work of nude art given the way her soft feminine contours were richly highlighted in crimson. It was not an overly erotic pose, although the aesthetic portion of D's mind had to admit that she looked quite appealing like that. He blinked hard a moment later as his gaze fell on the surface of her metallic implant, able to clearly see a series of sigils etched into the metal as it lay under the light of the red moon.

It took him several moments to realize that the spidery lines were not of any human origin, but instead were suspected to be associated with the world that the red moon had orbited before it was summoned across the cosmos. Only twice before had he been able to study such samples of that writing, and in both cases the material they had been etched into was so worn and brittle that merely breathing on them had produced a new series of fractures. He had once heard rumors of a woman who knew how to translate them, but he had never been able to find her for himself. The only one to even vouch for her existence was the oldest vampire among them all, one who existed in the time before the red moon had appeared, but the countless centuries had eroded both her memories and her mental faculties to leave him with doubts about the reliability of any of her information or assertions.

"Coral?" he spoke up in a cautious tone. He winced a moment later as she started to stretch again, putting a significant strain on his already-sore ribs and chest muscles.

"Mmmmmmm?" she purred absently.

"You need to move," D said flatly, all thoughts and curiosities about what was etched into her implant pushed aside.

"But I'm comfortable," she protested in a voice that was more of a soft whisper than a quiet murmur. "And I do love your warmth against me like this, my love," she added as she reached down to gently massage his upper thighs.

He thought carefully about what he could do to entice her to move before an idea hit him. "Perhaps you should go soak in a warm bath," he suggested in a carefully modulated tone. "I'm sure Pearl would be willing to wash your hair for you if you ask nicely."

"Oooh, now there's a thought," Coral said, making a soft humming sound to herself as she continued to stretch. "We never really bathed together, even when we were children, but we did brush one another's hair out fairly often. Or at least when she would let hers grow out," she added with a faint chuckle. "Don't get me wrong, I think short hair looks cute on her like that, but she should still let it all hang down every so often, just because... Mmmm, D?" she suddenly said, her tone abruptly changing timbre as she gently rolled off of him to wind up curled against his side. "Want to come soak with me?"

He had to suppress the urge to grunt softly in response. "I appreciate the offer, but I'll pass for the time being," he replied carefully. "I'm still somewhat worn out, and so I'd prefer to remain here and rest as much as you and Pearl will let me."

"Hmm?" she said, suddenly blinking hard and giving him a confused look. "What do you mean by that?"

"Your sister has a very strong grip," D pointed out in a flat tone.

"Ah, yes, that," Coral sighed as she glanced down at his inert manhood. "I see I'll have to explain a few things to her the hard way. I thought I made it quite clear I didn't want her harming you like that, but I see that I'll have to take the direct approach with her. I mean, I know she's always been a bit on the stubborn side, but she's never ignored me like this before..."

"Why don't you have her share the bath with you?" D suggested as a fairly bright flash of inspiration hit him. "I know it's far too soon to talk of such things as children and blood-marriages, but surely you'd need to discuss it with her beforehand so there are no surprises later. And what better place to talk than in the quiet comforts of a steaming tub?"

"Oh," Coral said, blinking hard before casting a visibly uneasy look at the closed door. "Yes, I suppose you're right about that. About needing to talk to her about that, I mean. I keep forgetting how she doesn't care for surprises too much. A pity, really..."

"I don't blame her," D spoke up calmly, drawing a surprised look from her. "I've no love for surprises either, as more often than not they are not to my liking in the end."

"Oh, don't say that," Coral sighed quietly, giving him an upset look.

"You should go," he suggested, trying to keep his expression neutral as her weight continued to press hard on his ribcage. "I'm sure Pearl will be appreciative of your being open and honest about your intentions instead of saving them for a surprise. After all, marriage is a very serious topic and given the closeness between the two of you I don't want there to be any sort of friction or unhappiness stemming from surprise or resentment."

A soft and loving smile crossed her face as she leaned over to kiss him. "You're concerned about me, aren't you?" she murmured several seconds later. "Don't worry, my love, I'll make sure Pearl doesn't harm you any further. I would still very much appreciate your promise not to harm her, however," she added, giving him a faintly expecting look.

"As I said before," D replied, trying to keep the weariness out of his voice, "I have reservations against exchanging one set of chains for another."

"Must it be this way?" she pleaded softly, giving him a truly hurt look. "She's my sister, I can't let anyone hurt her. Not even you," she added sadly as she reached out to stroke his face with her ungloved left hand.

"We can discuss this later, if you want," D commented, actively ignoring the way the hair on the back of his neck was standing at rigid attention from being so close to the implant. A quick glance showed that the etched sigils had disappeared, although D suspected that was because of the way her hand was positioned to be out of the direct light from the red moon. "But you may find that a woman-to-woman talk with Pearl about your intentions for the future will be just as revealing."

"Very well, my dark hunter," she murmured as she leaned over, kissing him soundly for several moments. "I will go speak with her. Will you be alright if I leave you like this?" she inquired, casting a glance up towards the open tunnel hatch.

"I'm sure I will be," D replied calmly, giving her a neutral look. "As I said earlier, a little fresh air does wonders to restore a weary spirit."

"Mmm, that it does," she agreed as she gave him a final kiss before gently easing herself down off of the padded surface. "Still, I'll have April come check on you in a bit, just in case. I'll be back soon," she said as she knelt down to scoop up her boots and clothing. "My love," she whispered, giving him a truly tender and loving smile before she turned and silently padded across the floor.

D waited until the door had opened and subsequently closed behind her before exhaling fairly hard, trying to let as much of the tension drain out of him as he could. He wasn't sure what had made him so edgy during those past few minutes, but was very much glad that she had left him alone. And with the hatch open as well...

((You're giving me a headache, you know that?)) it spoke up as he returned his focus to the overhead view. A frown crossed his face as he realized that the red moon was barely visible now, having moved across the sky so that only a bare sliver could be seen. The reflected light in the mirrored surfaces had likewise started to lessen, taking on a faintly pinkish tinge that suggested the once-crimson light was now being tainted by a much stronger glow of white from the smaller moon rising into the sky.

((Word of advice, D?)) it continued. ((Don't try to mess with Coral's mind, I'm pretty sure it's messed up nice and good already and you'd only be making things even worse.))

"Coral is a lost cause," D said quietly, almost regretfully. "In one way, I feel pity for her, for being trapped in a world where reality is only what you wish it to be. But she's still a danger to others, and so I can't just leave her be."

((You could always take her with you,)) it suggested, immediately drawing a very sharp look from him. ((You know, as a companion on the road. You'd have to keep a constant eye on her, of course, to make sure she doesn't hurt herself or anyone around her by accident, but she could make your life quite a pleasant one on a da... ow, stop it... D, it was just a thought, knock it off...))

"Quiet," D said firmly as he continued to keep his hand balled up in as tight a fist as he could manage. He glanced up towards the mirrored lava tube and sighed softly, knowing that the white moon had fully risen now and that whatever opportunity he might have had to absorb that oddly-refreshing energy from the undiluted light of the red moon was now gone.

((Eeesh,)) it grunted once D's hand finally relaxed, allowing it to return to a more normal shape. ((I was just saying, D. So now what do we do? If I had to guess what the future is going to be like, I'd have to say fairly short and bleak once Pearl dries off and gets dressed after her bath with Coral.))

D paused and cast a quick glance towards his hands. "How so?"

((This is just my view of things, okay?)) it warned him before taking truly deep breath, inhaling enough air to create a breeze that briefly tickled D's fingertips. ((Pearl's protective of Coral because of what Coral did for her when they were kids, that much is obvious, only now she is likely to be even more so after you killed the only other family figure she felt she had in her life, that being our dear friend Simon Winters. So imagine how bad Pearl is going to react to hearing Coral discussing the prospects of marriage to you? Settle down,)) it sighed as D shivered briefly. ((Yes, I don't see it happening and it makes my skin crawl to think about it too, but let's not get distracted here, okay?

((Pearl was visibly rattled when Coral mentioned she wants to have your baby,)) it continued. ((She was even more upset when Coral made that offer of sharing you with her at a later date. Maybe that was just Coral being a bit of a tease, but that still shocked the hell out of Pearl. Now picture how bad our poster-child for anger management therapy is going to react when she finds out that she might have to put up with you as a part of her life, or certainly as a part of her sister's life, and not being allowed to take her anger out on you to boot?))

"I know," D said simply. "In fact, I'm counting on it."

((Whoa, wait,)) it protested, ((Slow down. You mean you WANT Pearl to blow her top like a volcano again? Are you sure you don't have a sudden death-wish or anything?))

"Pearl is starting to understand I don't want Coral's attentions," he said calmly. "Her devotion to her sister stems from the belief that Coral cares for her, and now that belief is starting to crumble."

((Uh, D? I think I see where this is going,)) it said in an openly uneasy tone. ((If you're thinking you can turn Pearl against Coral, then you've got one hell of an uphill fight on your hands and not a lot of time left in which to play more mind games. It might work, but don't ask me to quote you any favorable odds of success,)) it warned. ((Granted a slim chance is better than no chance, but still...))

"Were you able to see the markings inscribed on Coral's implant?" D asked, ignoring the thoughts and doubts about what he was now committed to doing. He knew time was indeed in very short supply now, but he also knew that he simply couldn't allow himself to run the risk of impregnating Coral. And if it came down to either that or death, his mind was already made up...

((Yeah, umm, funny you should mention that,)) it said cautiously. ((Odd how moonlight works sometimes, right? One stray beam at just the right angle and all of a sudden you've got something to decipher. Or at least try to.))

"So what did it say?" D prompted carefully.

((How the hell should I know?)) it demanded with a faint note of irritation.  
((Reading languages are your idea of relaxing entertainment, not mine. Hell, I have a hard time understanding that vampire-hunter language you sometimes use. What did you call it again? Drool?))

"Druidic," D corrected absently.

((Look, all I can tell you is that I really, really think it has some sort of connection to both the red moon and that dead land on that one island,)) it said patiently. ((Don't ask me how, it's just a gut feeling. Anyway, I did my best to memorize what I saw, which wasn't much, so I might be able to draw a few of the scratches out for you later. That's assuming we live long enough to find a piece of paper and some drawing ink,)) it grumbled.

D said nothing as he studied the reflections in the tunnel mirrors before closing his eyes and trying to rest. He was profoundly grateful for the fact that his weight was off of his ankles for once, giving them a chance to heal. He knew that he wouldn't be allowed to lay resting like this for long, but it just might be enough to make a difference.

The question is, he had to ask himself, would that difference truly be enough to matter?

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	5. Bloodlust

Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust "Blood Ties"

by Troy A. Stanton note: This fanfic follows the events of the original stories "Winds of Change" and "Final Hours" (both written by me), and also incorporates a few elements from the story "Drawing Blood" by Catherine B. Krusberg. I have her permission to make use of her work as a source of material, so anything 'new' you see in here about D's past with Doris that didn't happen in the movie is most likely her original plot material.)

WARNING: This story contains graphic violence and adult content, please do not read beyond this point if you are easily offended by such things.

((Chapter Five - Bloodlust))

D turned his head slightly as he heard the door creak open. He initially thought it was April coming to visit him as Coral had said she would ask her timid slave to do, but his mood quickly changed as soon as he saw who his quiet visitor was.

"Hi," Abelyne said as she approached, casting a quick glance up towards the open hatch. The gesture fully exposed her neck, giving him a clear look at the puncture wound on her throat that hadn't been there the last time she came down to the dungeon. "Coral wanted me to close the hatch if it got too cold or uncomfortable for you down here," she explained as she absently scratched the back of her left hand.

D cast a quick glance up at the hatch as well before sighing softly. "You can close it if you wish," he spoke up calmly. "I'm done with it."

"Okay," the young girl said absently as she moved over to the levers and pushed on the one that controlled the roof hatch. She seemed to hesitate for several seconds before she carefully approached him, raising up on her tip-toes to peer at the full length of his body. "Umm, listen, I can't stay for long, but Coral and Pearl are still soaking in the tub and I just wanted to ask you a quick question. Just... what exactly is going on?"

The question caught him by surprise, causing him to twist his head to look directly at her. He looked away a few moments later as he noticed the way she was resting against the edge of the padded surface, leaning forward slightly at the waist and unconsciously thrusting her bare breasts forward in a pose that most would have described as openly inviting. "What do you mean?" he asked as he briefly turned his focus inward to clear his mind of the visual.

"Coral said something about having a baby," Abelyne said carefully, giving him a somewhat nervous look. "She then said something to Pearl about getting married before she sent me away to take care of a few things for her. I didn't hear what Pearl said as I was leaving, but I know that she wasn't happy with the idea. You... wouldn't happen to know anything about what Coral was saying earlier, would you? About having a baby and getting married?"

D sighed quietly before drawing in a breath to speak. "Coral wants me to give her a child," he said, pausing and glancing over at her as he heard her startled intake of breath. "And later she wants to be married to me in a ceremony of blood as vampires do."

"Oh, boy," Abelyne whispered, casting a truly startled look towards the open archway. "That's going to complicate things around here. No wonder Pearl sounded so upset. Umm, you haven't... you know... with Coral and all"  
she asked, her cheeks turning bright pink as she glanced down at his manhood.

"What do you mean by complicating things?" he asked, pointedly ignoring her question.

"I... can't..." Abelyne started to say before casting another worried glance towards the doorway and taking a deep breath. "Listen," she said in a low tone as she glanced back at him. "Coral is a good woman and I know she loves me, but Pearl absolutely hates young children. I'm surprised she didn't kill April when she first came here, and April knows it. You've got to take her away from here before it all goes to hell. Coral will take care of me, but if Coral has a baby and Pearl does something to her in anger..."

"I understand," D said simply. "I'll do what I can."

"Thank you," Abelyne said, giving him a warm smile. She paused as she cast a reflexive glance down at his groin, her ears turning a dark shade of red once again as she was suddenly aware of the fact that he was completely naked and that she was only dressed in a thin loincloth. "Umm, can you... you know, not... give Coral a child for awhile?" she managed to say in a calm and level tone despite the hard blush raging on her cheeks. "I mean, I know she wants a baby, but... now is not a good time."

"Believe me when I say I have no intentions of doing so," D said flatly.

"Thanks, I..." she started to say before abruptly whirling around. The sound reached D's ears a moment later, a very soft padding of bare feet on cold stone. A distant part of him was impressed with the acuteness of Abelyne's hearing, as the sound would normally not have been audible to a human unless they were actively paying attention to their surroundings.

"You should go," D said very quietly to Abelyne as Pearl entered the room, seeming to be wearing only a fairly short bathrobe. Her pale blue-white hair was still quite damp though combed out, suggesting that she was simply letting it air-dry. The look on her face was fairly neutral, but the constant flickers of pale crimson in her aqua-blue eyes like so many coal embers spoke volumes about her current mood.

"Abby?" Pearl said in a low but even tone as she approached, keeping her gaze solely focused on D. "Why are you down here?"

"Coral asked me to check on him after I finished cleaning her bedroom," Abelyne replied in an almost casual tone, as if she were either unaware or uncaring of Pearl's mood. "I just got finished a few minutes ago, so I came down here. Is Coral finished with her bath yet?"

"April is still washing her hair," Pearl said curtly, still keeping her attention on D. "But you should go up and help her anyway."

"Okay," Abelyne replied in a carefree tone as she turned and left the room without a second glance back.

D cast the briefest of glances at the departing figure before returning his attention to Pearl, giving her a level though unreadable look. He kept his eyes on her as she moved over to the control levers, calmly giving the center lever a shove to bring him into a vertical position. As expected, the pain in his ankles returned with a vengeance to remind him that his respite hadn't been enough to let him heal properly.

The silence between them stretched on for what felt like a minor eternity, their eyes locked on one another and barely seeming to blink. The only sounds that could be heard were the very soft and subtle rasping as they breathed in slow and steady mantras. The flickering glow in her eyes seemed to come and go at irregular intervals, suggesting that she was actively thinking about a number of things that swung her mood back and forth like a pendulum.

"Every time I come down here to talk to you," she finally said in a low tone, her lips barely moving as she spoke, "The more amazed I am by my sister's behavior. She was never like this before, so that only leaves me to conclude that you're doing something to her."

"Did you enjoy your bath together?" D asked calmly.

The question clearly caught her off-guard, causing her to blink hard in surprise before she could recover. "So what's it to you, hunter?" she asked in an openly wary voice. "Or should I ask what sort of fantasies you were having while we were up there?" she added as she cast a disdainful glance down at his crotch.

"The only fantasy I have is for Coral to wake up and realize that I want nothing to do with her," D stated firmly. "Unfortunately, I think she's too blinded by her own desires to notice."

"Oh, now this is amusing," Pearl said to the room at large as she leaned into him, pointedly resting her knee against his groin. "First she says she wants a child, now there's some nonsense about a blood-marriage, and you want me to believe you want nothing to do with her? Give me a break," she spat.

"Maybe I should be asking you for one," D countered in an edged tone as he leaned forward as best he could, ignoring the sudden increase in the pressure of her kneecap against his manhood. "Do you really think I want her, Pearl? Do you truly believe I would sacrifice my life and my future in the pursuit of justice against vampires, only to suddenly turn around and start having such children of my own? Your sister is ill and doesn't know what she's doing."

Her hand lashed out far too quickly for him to have followed or even to prepare for the blow. The world as a whole seemed to briefly shake as the back of her hand connected with his cheek, rocking him back as much as the chains would allow him. "Fool," she said simply.

"You're the fool, Pearl," D countered even as he braced himself for future reactions from her dark temper. "Your love for your sister blinds you even as Coral's insanity blinds her. Think!" he demanded as he was struck again, his voice briefly faltering from the intensity of the pain. "What sane woman would open her arms to one who's hands were still wet with her father's blood? Would you do such a thing, Pearl? So why would Coral?"

He quickly braced himself for a third blow, narrowing his eyes to stare deep into her own as she remained poised to strike again. "Do you think Coral really loves me?" he spoke up in a low but even tone, keeping one eye on the way her shaking hand was still drawn back and the other on her own expression of barely-controlled rage. "Ask yourself why, Pearl. Why would she turn to me to have a child when I would just as soon have killed her had we met in your father's castle? Ask yourself why she would ask to be bound in blood to me after all that I have done. Ask yourself why she thinks I care for her when I said to her face that I don't. Ask yourself why, Pearl."

"Coral has her own reasons," Pearl said in a dangerously low tone. "She always has, that's just how she is."

D narrowed his eyes as he decided to make a final push. "And you don't see that as insanity?" he asked very carefully. "You don't see denial of the obvious as being troublesome?"

"You don't know my sister," Pearl whispered harshly, her hand still drawn back as if to strike at a moment's notice. "Just like you don't know me. That is your problem, hunter, you know absolutely nothing."

"I think given what has transpired these past two days," D said in a very careful tone, "I can say that I know your sister quite well."

Instead of the backhanded response that he expected, he was answered with a low and distinctly bitter laugh. "Oh, I'll bet you do, hunter," she said, her lips curling up into a truly dark sneer. "I'll bet you do. In fact, she told me how you fucked her nice and good earlier and I'll bet she's still got that smile on her face even now. Tell me how good she was, hunter," she said as she pressed her knee harder against him. "Let me hear you brag about how you took her."

"You're still a virgin, aren't you?" D asked calmly. A truly intense wave of pain overcame him as she drew her knee back only to slam it forward again, compressing his testicles and driving the air from his lungs in a mad exodus.

"What's it to you, hunter?" she snarled as she grabbed his chin and forced his head back to stare into his eyes. "Or is every woman you meet supposed to be a cheap slut who spreads her legs open at the drop of a hat?"

"Coral told me what happened," D said as calmly as he could manage, still figuratively seeing stars after being racked. "About how she offered herself to your brothers' friend. She told me why she did it."

"And so what?" Pearl demanded in a truly glacial tone.

"You were afraid after that, weren't you?" D said carefully, ignoring the intensity of crimson rage in her eyes. "Afraid of being vulnerable and exposed to men. That's why you never took a lover for yourself, instead watching your sister and her lovers from a distance when she had them chained down and thus couldn't possibly try to touch you."

Pearl slowly shook her head. "You know nothing..."

"You finally wanted to try it for yourself, but Coral killed him before you could find the courage," D continued, keeping his eyes focused on hers and trying very hard to ignore the pain in both his jaw and his groin. "You said so yourself, you know nothing of men and know nothing of true intimacy."

"You..." Pearl started to say before her voice briefly failed her, the glow in her eyes flickering strongly now. "You... know... nothing..."

"If I know nothing, Pearl," D challenged quietly, "Then tell me what YOU know of it. Tell me what sex is like, how it feels to have someone inside you,  
how it feels to be brought to orgasm. You don't know, do you?" he added as she remained perfectly silent. "And why is that, Pearl? Why don't you know?"

"None of your damn business, hunter," she growled in a low tone. "I'll sleep with whomever I want, whenever I want, and it's none of your business."

"Coral won't let you, will she?" D said softly. "She's still trying to protect her little sister like she did so long ago. And because you look up to her as the only family you have, as the only one whom you think has ever loved you or cared for you, you listen to her. You let her treat you like a child,  
the little baby sister she always has to protect and watch out for."

This time he could see her fist lashing out, curling into a tight ball a bare instant before it slammed square into the center of his chest where his sternum was. A truly agonizing wave of pain erupted in his chest as he felt something crunch, followed by what had to have been the longest moments of his life as he waited to see if his lungs would reinflate as he struggled to draw in a breath.

"You dare..." she whispered as a single tear trickled from the corner of her aqua-blue eye. "Coral is my sister, of course she's always looked out for me. Nobody else has, hunter, and I'm not going to let you hurt her..."

D waited until he was absolutely sure he wasn't going to pass out from the pain of trying to breathe before lifting his head up. "What did she say that night, Pearl?" he wheezed, his voice so broken as to barely be audible. "When she walked in just as you were about to be raped. What did she say to him, and what didn't she say to you? Did she say she did it for you, or did she say she had her own reasons for doing so?"

"One more word and I'll kill you," she promised, her own voice barely more than a shaken whisper. "Not another word, hunter..."

"Kill me, then," D replied calmly. "But that will not erase the question,  
nor will it erase the answer. You know the truth, Pearl, even if you don't want to hear it or say it. You don't have to answer me, but you will have to answer your conscience. Honor, Pearl," he whispered as he suddenly slumped,  
barely able to finish speaking. "Answer yourself with honor, as nobody else can answer it for you. What... did... she... say?"

Pearl remained as motionless as a statue for several moments before her lips finally parted, just enough to form the words that were delivered in a broken whisper. "Such a waste, don't you think?" she breathed. "Honestly, do you really want her, a mere child? Or would you rather have a real woman to please? The choice is yours, of course, but I think we both know what it is that you really want. I'll be waiting in the hayloft..."

D summoned the strength to open his eyes once again and lift his head up, feeling his stomach turn into an icy pit at the expression on her face. He was about to say something when he heard another series of soft footsteps, turning his head slightly to look as Coral padded into the room. Like Pearl, she was dressed in only a bathrobe as she continued to run a comb through her silvery hair. Her left hand remained ungloved, the dark metal of her implant standing out in stark contrast against the rest of her pale and seemingly flawless skin.

"Pearl?" Coral said, blinking in surprise as she realized that her sister was deeply upset on something. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong, sis," Pearl replied in a hollow tone, her expression seeming to harden slightly as she kept her focus on D. "I was just asking D what he thought of this whole marriage nonsense."

Coral raised a delicate eyebrow. "I would hardly call it nonsense," she chided gently as she moved over to gently lean against D's shoulder, her left hand still combing out a lengthy coil of hair. "After all, it only makes sense for us to be bound by blood after we are bound in flesh, as we would be once our child is born."

D cast a neutral glance at Pearl before closing his eyes. "You're not pregnant yet, Coral," he said carefully. "Nor will you be if I have any say in the matter."

"No, not yet," Coral sighed before her expression turned coy and sultry. "But I soon will be," she purred, reaching out to run her fingertip along the lines of his jaw. "Tomorrow, my love," she whispered as she leaned forward to kiss him.

Pearl's eyes narrowed slightly as she saw the way D tried to turn his head away from Coral, resulting in the kiss being planted on his cheek. "Are you sure that's a good idea, sis?" Pearl spoke up, her tone still sounding more than a little shaken. "Trying to get knocked up so soon?"

"So soon?" Coral inquired, giving her sister a curious look. "With as long as I've waited for this to come about? I know the old adage about how patience is a virtue and all, but let's be honest about this one, okay? When have I ever been a patient individual? Besides," she added coyly as she turned her focus back to D. "Even if I hadn't gotten rid of my virtue a century ago, I most certainly would have given it to D earlier..."

"He's not housebroken yet," Pearl pointed out carefully. "Surely you can wait another month for your perpetual itch to return while we make sure that he won't be doing anything harmful to us."

"Oh, listen to you," Coral fussed, giving Pearl a slightly irritated look. "I'm going to be the mother of his child, he's not going to hurt me. And the only reason he's still chained up like this is because he hasn't promised not to hurt you. And believe me when I say I'll be glad when I can finally unchain him from our little playpen here," she added in a meaningful tone. "Don't get me wrong, I actually enjoyed that little bath we just shared and you know I absolutely love having my hair brushed out like that, but I'd also like to be able to share that with D as well. Granted we're not married yet, so I suppose we shouldn't be talking of such pleasures together, but who bothers with all those pre-nuptial 'taboos' anymore?"

"Right..." Pearl said slowly, clearly not convinced. "So let me get this right, you're blaming me for him being all tied up?"

"Silly," Coral chuckled as she rested her head on D's shoulder, giving her sister an openly amused smile. "I'm only doing it to protect you. After all, that is what sisters are for, right? Yes, all I'm waiting on is for our little hunter here to promise me he won't hurt you," she said, her voice taking on a honeyed echo as she purred at him. "That's all that is keeping us apart like this. Just give me your word you won't harm my dear little sister, and I would gladly free you from our adamantium chains..."

"That's it, huh?" Pearl spoke up, her voice taking on a faintly tempered edge. "He just makes a promise and gets to run free? Coral, do you really think he can be trusted like that?"

"Of course," Coral replied lightly, still smiling softly at D. "He is a man of honor, after all. If he isn't serious about keeping his word, then why hasn't he promised me that so far, hmm?"

"As I said," D said quietly, keeping his eyes on Pearl, "I'm not about to trade one set of chains for another, even if it means my so-called freedom."

Pearl just shook her head slowly in disbelief. "And you think my sister is insane?" she murmured quietly.

"Honor, Pearl," D replied simply, giving her a piercing look. "I will not make a promise I don't intend to keep, it's as simple as that. And speaking of honor... I owe you an apology for what I said earlier."

"Oh?" Coral said, lifting her head up from his shoulder and giving him a startled look. She cast a quick glance at Pearl and blinked as she realized that Pearl seemed to be even more surprised than she was.

"I'm listening," Pearl said, narrowing her eyes as a veil of suspicion suddenly fell over her.

"You spoke to me of your pain earlier," D said quietly. "You didn't have to, and I could see that it hurt to do so, but you nonetheless faced that pain and answered me truthfully when you could easily have remained silent. That is a sign of honor, and I was wrong for saying you didn't have any. Thank you for proving me wrong and for having the strength to share your pain with me."

Pearl's eyes suddenly flashed with crimson before the glow began to fade. "Did you enjoy seeing my pain, hunter?" she demanded, her mouth pressed into a flat line.

"No," D said as he lifted his head up to look directly into her eyes. "I do not relish seeing the pain of others, and like having to inflict pain even less so, but there is no dishonor in sharing your pain with others. It is... a human need to share such things, as one can draw strength from such sharing. Even when all that is shared is pain and sorrow," he added quietly. "You have my respect for being courageous enough to share your pain with me like that."

"D..." Coral purred in a silken tone as she reached up to embrace him, gently pressing her body against his. "I had no idea you were such a softie like this. Certainly the legends never said anything about it..."

"Of course they didn't," D pointed out, causing both Coral and Pearl to blink. "What is so remarkable about being human? All that the legends concern are feats which are inhuman or are seemingly beyond the abilities of mortal men and women. They speak of my strength and skill, as most legends do, but why should they speak of my human emotions when all humans are like that?"

"But you're not human," Pearl pointed out. "You're a dunpeal."

"Be that as it may," D countered, "I am no less human on the inside than my mother and no more a vampire than my father. I am both and I can understand both. You say I don't know you, Pearl, and perhaps that applies to the small details of your life that make you a unique individual, but don't you think I know what it feels like to be trapped between two worlds like you? To feel the burning of my blood as it calls out for the blood of others, to feel the hate and anger burning inside me when I contemplate what my own life has been like? If nothing else, keep my age in mind. I honestly don't remember how old I am anymore, but I know I am older than your father was. And if he can understand something because of his experiences in life, then why can't I?"

"Who said he understood me either?" Pearl spat before she whirled around on her bare heel and stalked out of the room, her hands clenched together into tight fists. Her footsteps seemed to be unusually loud as she crossed the room and slipped out the doorway, leaving D alone in the room with a visibly uneasy Baroness Coral Winters.

"D?" she asked carefully, giving him an unsettled look. "What was that all about? What pain were you talking about earlier?"

He glanced at her for a few moments before closing his eyes. "Surely you know your own sister far better than I do," he murmured.

"Of course I do," Coral replied, giving him a faintly uneasy look. "But that doesn't mean I know everything. So tell me what's going on."

"Your sister wants my respect," D pointed out, still keeping his eyes closed and largely ignoring her. "I was just letting her know that she earned a small measure of it earlier."

"Mmmm," she purred as she nuzzled his cheek gently. "You seem to be able to get along with her," she pointed out. "So why won't you promise me not to hurt her?"

D opened his eyes just enough to cast a very brief sidelong glance at her, absently making note of the look on her face. "Honor," he said simply as he closed his eyes once again. "You should head upstairs, as it should be close to sunrise now and we're both still in need of a rest."

"It shouldn't be that close to sunrise," she pointed out.

"Consider this," D suggested as he started to turn his focus inward to try to shut his body down into dormancy again. "The sooner we both get some rest and perhaps even sleep, the sooner the night will come and we can put an end to things once and for all."

"D?" she said, reaching up to hold his chin firmly. She waited until he parted his eyes slightly to look at her before continuing, "I'm not sure I like the way you said that. What do you mean by putting an end to things?"

"I thought you liked surprises?" he inquired softly.

She raised an eyebrow at him in silence for several seconds before the corners of her mouth finally edged upwards. "Okay, I suppose I walked into that one," she admitted with a very faint giggle.

"As I said, we both need some rest," D pointed out.

"Oh, very well," she sighed as she leaned forward to kiss him tenderly. "I will let you be, my dark hunter, though I'll warn you now... you better get as much rest as you can, because tonight you're going to need it," she purred in a honeyed tone as she pressed herself suggestively against him.

"Indeed I will," D replied, giving her an unreadable look.

"Stop that," she murmured as she leaned forward, pressing herself harder against him and letting her lips brush against his as she spoke. "You're going to get me all excited again, talking to me like that..."

"You'll manage," he replied dryly.

"Such a tease," she admonished as she reached up to touch his lips with her fingertips before moving her hand down to untie the sash to her robe. A truly delightful purr rose up from her throat as she pressed her groin against him, rubbing the hardened points of her nipples against his chest.

"Coral..." he said in a faint tone of warning.

"I know, my love," she whispered back in a plaintive tone, giving him a truly longing look even as she continued to gently rub against him. "I can't help it if I want you right now..."

D just shook his head to himself. "Go to bed, Coral," he whispered.

She sighed softly and gave him a deep kiss. "You know I'm not going to be able to sleep very well being all worked up like this," she murmured.

"Try a cold shower," D suggested calmly, prompting a faint giggle.

"Eww," she replied, leaning back to give him a look that was only somewhat amused. "You do know that doesn't work on women, right? Oh, D," she sighed as he blinked in surprise. "What am I going to do with you?" she asked the room at large, giving him another smile before leaning in to kiss him yet again.

"I'll see you tonight," he said quietly, trying not to dwell on the sheer arrogance of his statement given the fact that he was the one who was chained down and thus couldn't come or go as he pleased.

"Tonight, my love," she breathed in a husky tone as she stepped back, not bothering to tie her robe shut. "Tonight..." she repeated softly before she turned away and padded across the room. She paused in the archway and looked back at him, bringing a pair of fingertips to her lips and kissing them softly before she left the room. The dungeon door was closed behind her, the soft click of the lock being engaged echoing unusually loudly in the still air.

He cast a quick glance at his left hand, half-expecting it to speak up and share some of its thoughts about the current situation. Much to his surprise the parasite remained quiet, allowing him to close his eyes and focus what was left of his thoughts in undisturbed silence. Tonight would be the end of his situation, he decided as he continued to shut his body down. He would find a way to escape Coral's clutches... one way, or the other.

The tingle of the rising sun caught him just as he was about to slip back into the quiet depths of enforced slumber, leaving him hanging on that most elusive of precipices between dreamless sleep and sleepless dreams for what felt like an eternity before the world finally became quiet and black as his consciousness was claimed by the abyss.

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The voices in his dreams seemed to drift in and out like ghosts, not fully registering on his mind but still audible at the same time. It wasn't enough to rouse him, but they nonetheless remained with him as they continued to speak in hushed tones and spectral whispers.

((Look, I've got a very bad feeling about this, okay?))

"What do you need me to do?"

((You can't get involved in this, I'll never hear the end of it if you get caught or something happens.))

"Don't... don't worry about me, just tell me what you need."

((I'm not kidding, I can't... oh, hell with it. Listen carefully... in that third pouch on D's chest belt... no, the other belt... yes, that one. The third one from the top... yes, that's it. Carefully, and I do mean very carefully, open it up. And whatever you do don't drop it.))

"Hey, this looks like..."

((Exactly, but it's got a little more oomph than you'd think, and I'll bet with the condition her weapon is in...))

"Right. Give me a moment, I've watched her do this before."

((Just be careful, okay? I mean it, don't sneeze, don't fart...))

"Excuse me."

((You know what I mean, just be careful, alright?))

"... Almost done... there, it's full."

((Just tie it shut like you found it, put it back, and make sure to wash your hands before you head back upstairs. We'll handle the rest. Oh, and if you hear it go off? Give us three minutes before you try to come down here to see how things went.))

"Please, take care of him, he's our only hope now."

((Tell me about it. Now go on before you get caught.))

"D... be strong..."

More spectral murmurs and whispers came after that, softer words and far more subtle sounds that quickly lulled him back down into the depths and back into the cool, empty embrace of unconsciousness.

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It wasn't the tingle of the setting sun that finally roused him, though he was aware of the transition. The sensation that drew his conscious mind up out of the darkness and back into clarity was the feeling of a hand on his cheek, a gentle touch that was more like a caress as it probed his jaw.

So it ends, D found himself thinking as his eyelids parted, expecting to find himself face-to-face with Coral and her eager desires. As such, he was more than a little surprised to discover that it was Pearl's touch on his face, her aqua-blue eyes seeming to be openly haunted by something.

"Are you awake?" she asked softly, her lips pressed together in something that wasn't quite a frown but still indicated a less-than-pleased mood.

"I am now," D replied cautiously as he blinked and tried to refocus. He had to blink a second time to ensure his eyes were clear as he realized that she seemed to still be wearing the bathrobe from earlier, a soft mass of satin-like fabric that barely came down to her knees and left a good portion of her upper chest exposed.

"I was thinking about what you said earlier," she said in a muted tone, her hand still brushing against his cheek and jaw. "About how you knew what I was feeling and all. For the longest time, I didn't think anyone could ever know how I truly feel inside. Not Coral, not my father, nobody. And yet... you somehow know. Every time you spoke to me... you knew what I was, what I felt. How is that possible, hunter? You know nothing of me, and yet... you know me. How is this?"

"You said it yourself," D replied quietly. "We are all related by blood, being descended from noble vampires. But you and I are alike, being dunpeals born to human mothers, and so we are subjected to the same prejudices of mixed blood. The nobles view us as commoners and impure, rejecting us as unworthy spawn born from simple lust. Humans view us with suspicion and even hatred, blaming us for the sins of our fathers. The only true difference between you and I, Pearl, is that I was born a number of centuries before you were. That's it. Everything else is the result of life's experiences, knowledge that you can gain just as easily as I did, and perhaps with far less pain armed with the understanding that it can be done, as it was done once before by a dunpeal just like you."

"Alright, hunter," she said as she lowered her arm to her side and took a single step back. "Look at me and tell me what you see, then. Tell me about the woman standing before you."

"I know you're hurt, Pearl," D said gently. "You think you were abandoned by your mother at birth, tormented by your father's noble family, and cast out by humanity as a whole. That leaves a lot of pain inside your human heart, and without human love to comfort you, a love that not even your sister understands well enough to give you, that pain in your heart has been allowed to fester in your spirit like a disease. The rage you find yourself always fighting against is a result of that darkness in your blood, a burning hatred you want to get rid of but don't know how. Even now it burns," he added quietly as he saw the faintest of flickers in her eyes.

"What can I say, hunter?" she said in a low tone. "That truth hurts?"

"Only if you let it," D replied. "When you learn to accept that you are who you are, the daughter of a noble man and a human woman, and that nothing you can do in this world can ever change that, then you can begin the process of healing on the inside. I fought against my father's blood for centuries, and even today I still dislike its presence in my veins, but I finally realized that I simply couldn't turn away from it. A human taught me that," he added. "She opened my eyes to my humanity, reminding me of what I had forgotten so long ago. You have a human heart and a human soul, Pearl, just like I do, and like me you need to reach out to others and learn how to love again."

Pearl crossed her arms over her petite chest and hugged herself tightly. "And how do I do that?" she asked simply.

"Let go of your anger for humans," D murmured. "Do them no harm. It may sound foolish, but all you need to do is do nothing towards them. In time they will start to reach out to you. Don't ask me why, as to this day I still don't understand it for myself, but they will. Reaching out to others is a human need, and for reasons that vary from one human to another they will just as easily reach out to others who are not human. How many dunpeals were born to those who genuinely cared for their noble lovers? How many such couples were married, either by vow or in blood? You need not do anything, Pearl, merely do them no harm and wait for them to approach you on their own terms."

"Easier said than done," she pointed out in a neutral tone.

D nodded slowly. "I know," he said softly. "It took centuries for me to realize this and even then it was only because of two human women who saw into my soul, a soul I didn't even know I had, and reached out to it with the warmth of their human hearts. If the power of human emotions can reach through the barriers I had erected out of ignorance and self-defense, walls of isolation that had existed for centuries, then just think of what they can do for the pain in your heart that has only existed for a dozen decades. I am not trying to belittle your pain," he added as her eyes flashed crimson again, "Only to compare it to the depth of my own for so long. If opening my heart to humans can help me, then it can help you as well."

"Help me how?" she asked carefully, gazing down at his chest. A faint frown crossed her face as she saw the bruise over his heart, a perfect imprint of her right fist where she had hit him earlier.

"To show you what it's like to be human," he replied. "To show you what comfort feels like, to teach you what needs you know you have but never could identify before, and how to satisfy those needs."

"Uh-huh," she said, her eyebrow arching up slightly. "Funny how we find ourselves on the topic of satisfaction. And I'm sure these humans would be more than willing to show me what it's like to be... satisfied?"

D just sighed softly to himself. "There are more pleasures in life than simple sex," he explained. "The joy of a simple touch, the comfort of hearing a loved one's voice, the satisfaction of knowing they will always be with you. Yes, there is always a physical aspect of it, but it doesn't have to be focused on sex or love-making. No doubt that at some point you will find yourself with an offer of physical intimacy, but it will be up to you to accept. True love will never force anything on you, but will instead gently offer it to you to accept at your own pace. And Pearl?" he added as he gave her a pointed look. "Nobody is going to bat an eyelash if you decide you wish to remain a virgin, as quite a number of humans do not view the pleasures of the flesh as being truly worthwhile. If you had any idea how long I avoided a woman's bed, you would probably laugh."

"Oh, really?" she purred as she stepped close to him, reaching up to run her hand along his jaw. "Humor me, hunter, tell me how long ago it was."

"Time is not easy for me to keep track of anymore," he pointed out as he narrowed his eyes slightly. "I would say it's been two centuries, perhaps a decade or two less, since that first night in a woman's bed and arms."

Pearl blinked in surprise before raising a delicate eyebrow. "And you're how old, hunter?" she prodded. She got only silence in response and gave him a very studious look. "You're serious..." she said in a near-whisper.

"I don't lie," D said firmly. "About anything."

"And that would be... honor?" she inquired lightly. She got a solemn nod in reply and tilted her head slightly, almost as if she were a bird studying something of avian interest. "I have to admit I don't understand it too well."

"You will," D assured her quietly. "Just think of how a spider-web is built, one strand at a time, and just how long it takes to build before it can be spread wide enough to matter."

"Bah," she said softly with the faintest twinkle of amusement in her aqua-blue eyes. "Let's not talk of sex and love, then try to speak of spreading things wide. I might think you had motives or intentions."

D just grunted softly to himself. "I don't mean any disrespect, but I'm not interested in either you or Coral like that."

"Mmm, I'm not so sure, hunter," she countered as she glanced down. "You still haven't convinced me that you didn't want to bed my sister earlier. Or, for that matter, that you weren't having dark fantasies about me when I told you about almost being raped," she added, her tone starting to darken slightly.

D closed his eyes and sighed softly in open resignation. "What would you have me say or do to prove otherwise?" he inquired as he looked back up at her. "If you could read my mind, we could have settled this two days ago."

"I don't know," she replied with a casual shrug. "But go ahead and keep protesting your innocence anyway. I'll admit I like listening to your voice," she added with a faint smile that struck D as being slightly predatory.

"If I didn't know better, Pearl," D spoke up carefully, bracing himself for a possibly bad reaction, "I'd think you wanted me to fantasize about you."

A dark look promptly swept over her face like a stormcloud before she closed her eyes and slowly exhaled through her nose. "And why would I want you to think that, hunter?" she inquired in a neutral tone once she opened her eyes and appeared to have largely calmed down.

"Jealousy comes to mind," D pointed out. "You welcome Coral's protective nature, but at the same time it chafes you to be told that you're not ready for something or that it's too dangerous for you."

"Maybe," she allowed in an even tone. "But she's still my sister."

"And that gives her free rein to run your life?" D countered. "You are right to find comfort and solace in her presence, just as she is right to keep an eye out for your best interests. But you are not a child, Pearl, and Coral is not your mother... though you may have wished her to be."

"We covered this before, hunter," Pearl said with a dark frown. "I don't have a mother. I never have."

"But you wanted one growing up, didn't you?" D spoke up softly. "Like all children do, human and vampire. And who was the only female figure in your life that you could look up to, who cared about you and took care of you?"

"So what if Coral was the only one who cared about me?" Pearl countered.

"Pearl..." D started to say before hesitating, wondering if it was truly wise to continue with his train of thought.

"Okay, so maybe I'm a little envious of her right now," Pearl said in a faintly bitter tone. "I'm not sure what to make of Coral's insistence on you being the father of her child or this crazy idea of a blood-marriage between you and her, but at least she seems to have that option available to her."

"And you don't?" D replied.

"I don't see any suitors lining up and knocking on my door," she pointed out in a fairly acidic tone.

"And Coral does?" he pointed out archly. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but she has to chain down her current 'suitor' because she fears her death at his hands if he gets loose. That doesn't sound like a situation I would be all too eager to have for myself," he added dryly.

She paused for a moment to think, absently glancing down at the bruise on his chest before looking back up into his dark eyes. "You know what?" she said quietly. "I'll grant you that one. But humor me for a moment here and tell me just what precisely I'm supposed to be jealous of?"

"Attention," D replied. "Someone to talk to, someone who won't hurt or demean you. Someone you respect... and someone who respects you in return."

Pearl shook her head slowly. "You don't respect either of us," she said quietly, more to herself than to him.

"Quite the contrary," D replied. "I respect your willingness to talk to me like this, one intelligent person to another, instead of raging at me and thriving on my pain. I respect your sense of honor, new as it is to you, and your willingness to share your deepest pain with me despite the cost."

"And Coral?" she whispered.

"Your sister is not in her right mind, Pearl," D said very carefully. "I fear for her sanity, as she doesn't seem to be able to see that I do not want to be her lover or the father of her child. You yourself have seen that with your own eyes and ears."

"No," Pearl said as she shook her head slowly.

"She's sick," D insisted gently. "She needs help, and right now only you can help her. You need to get her to understand I don't want to give her a child, nor will I let her force me again. If it comes down to it, I will fight her with every ounce of my strength tonight, even if it means my death."

"Ha!" Pearl gasped as she took a step back, a look of surprised amusement crossing her face. "You think Coral is mad? Listen to you! You slept with her twice already, and now you say you'll kill yourself if she wants you to take her again?"

D shook his head in frustration as he sensed he was hitting the same wall of denial yet again. "Pearl, Coral is controlling you," he blurted out.

"Right," Pearl replied with a sneer of contempt.

"Then why does your hand itch every so often?" D demanded, causing her to pause and sober up. "Or have you ever noticed how Abelyne seems to always be scratching her hand as well? Why in the same place as her implant, or do you truly believe it to be mere coincidence? Do you know what that implant in her hand is or what it can do?"

"I suppose you know?" she challenged in a low tone.

"I know its power," D replied darkly. "I know she's been trying to use it against me, calling to me like a siren in order to seduce me. Have you ever touched it with your bare hand? I think you have," he added as her expression suddenly became perfectly neutral. "Tell me you didn't feel a jolt of energy inside it, a power that seemed ready to reach out and grab you."

"That's just the properties of the metal," Pearl replied in a hollow tone.  
"Several metals are reactive to energy like that."

"But to what energy?" D persisted. "What power source does she use? Where does the energy come from? And why would you feel it in your mind if it was just ordinary energy like in your mace?"

She narrowed her eyes dangerously at him as she thought, the faintest of flickers appearing and disappearing in her eyes at random. "I don't believe you," she finally said in a low, almost inaudible tone.

"Pearl?" D said quietly, allowing the tension to drain from his body as he came dangerously close to simply giving up. "Why would I lie? To try to turn you against your sister for my own amusement? I'm trying to help the both of you so I won't have to kill you. Coral is not in her right mind, and you are under her influence. Ask yourself, for your sister's sake and for your own, do you really believe I am lying? If so, then pick up my sword from the shelf behind you and kill me now. Give me the honor of dying in peace so I won't have to fight your sister when she comes for me to have the child she wants."

Pearl stared at him for a number of moments before she turned around and walked over to the shelf. She studied the contents piled on it before she very carefully picked up the massive sword that D had been using for ages now, a well-crafted and balanced blade that seemed to be impossibly long to wield. She carried it back and came to a halt in front of him, holding the scabbard with one hand and easing the hilt back with the other to expose a good foot of the polished metal blade.

"Mmmm," she said softly to herself in admiration. "This is a very nice sword, D. Where'd you get it?"

"A gift," D replied quietly, almost too quiet for her to hear. "From the first woman I ever loved. It was her father's, and she gave it to me after I lost my sword saving her from a noble vampire."

"Oh?" Pearl said, looking up at him in surprise.

"Her name was Doris Lang," he continued quietly, letting her see the pain in his eyes at the memories. "She was the one who seduced me, giving me her virginity in exchange for my own, and ultimately opened my eyes to the world of human love I had been too blind to see, let alone understand. The sword I have kept with me ever since, a reminder of what she meant to me, something I didn't fully understand until too much time had passed and she was gone."

"Interesting," Pearl said as she looked down to study the blade for a few more moments. "Tell me more, hunter," she asked as she returned her gaze to the haunted lines of his face. "About the other humans in your life."

"The clasp on my knife-belt," D said simply.

"What about it?" she prompted carefully.

"The flower petal is from Leila's grave," he explained. "From the flowers I brought to her to fulfill a promise made to one another during the chase to rescue Charlotte Elbourne from Meier Link. She touched my heart and showed me what it is to truly love, and to never fear the power of a woman."

"Leila," Pearl repeated as something clicked in her memory. "I've heard Coral mention that name before, back when we went travelling for awhile."

D nodded slowly. "She was the one who made me promise not to refuse the offer of human warmth and love should it be made by a companion after a time of great stress and trauma. Fulfilling that promise is why you have heard the stories of me, the quiet ones about what happens long after the battle is won."

"Ahhhhh," Pearl purred softly as she slid the sword back into the scabbard and carefully leaned it against the utility cart. She paused as she noticed his sudden shift in attention and smirked, reaching out to pick the weapon back up again. "Nice try, hunter, but I'll not be leaving this out where you might be able to get it," she said as she carried it back to the shelf.

He said nothing as she returned to him, a faint smile still lingering on her lips. "Interesting stories, hunter," she mused. "And what other kinds of trophies do you have of your other conquests, hmm? What other tokens do you have to remind you of which beds you've graced, which women you've taken? Do I want to ask what you'll ask of Coral as a keepsake?" she said in a mockery of a husky tone as she approached, pressing herself gently against him.

"Pearl..." he said in a warning tone as he started to look towards the open dungeon door. He quickly refocused his gaze on her as she reached out to grab his jaw, keeping him still and preventing him from turning away from her.

"Morbid curiosity, hunter," she continued in a dark whisper as she leaned forward, brushing her lips against his ear. "Humor me for just one moment and tell me, what you would have asked of me had I submitted to your lusts like my sister did? What memento would remind you the most of taking my virginity?"

"Has he taken you, then?" a voice inquired almost casually.

Pearl promptly whipped around in a burst of startled motion, blinking hard as she found Coral making her way across the floor in perfect silence. Like she still was, her sister was still wearing only the bathrobe from earlier in the day, her bare feet moving so lightly so as not to betray her presence with even the slightest hint of noise. "Coral..." Pearl said, still too surprised to think of anything better to say.

"Pearl, you disappoint me greatly," Coral said in a neutral tone as she continued to cross the room, finally coming to a stop next to the utility cart. She didn't look at either D or Pearl as she spoke, absently studying the odd collection of items that had had accumulated on the cart's flat surface since the whole situation had started. "I tell you not to hurt his face, I come down here one day and find his jaw covered in bruises. I tell you not to hurt him after that, and I find a handprint on his chest that could only have come from a blow that by all rights should have killed him instantly. I tell you that he is mine... and now I come down here to find you all over him, asking what he wants in exchange for your virginity."

"Coral, it's not like that at all!" Pearl protested, giving her sister a truly upset look.

"You've never disobeyed me before like this," Coral said, seeming not to have heard Pearl as she reached out with her ungloved left hand to carefully pick up the ancient flintlock pistol she had brought down earlier. "Oh, you've had your moments where you needed a little extra prodding, but we've all had those and I never thought very much of them. But this, Pearl... I just don't get it," she said, shaking her head slowly, still not looking at her.

"Coral..." Pearl started to say as she felt her blood grow cold at her sister's unexpected demeanor.

"I would have let you play with him," Coral murmured in a low tone as she carefully checked over the pistol, easing the housing back to peer into the barrel before absently nodding in satisfaction and gently closing it. "I told you I would, once I was pregnant and too swollen to please him anymore myself. But you just couldn't wait, could you? You just had to come down here tonight, on the one night I had waited years for and was finally ready for him..."

"Coral!" Pearl blurted out in horror as the silvery-haired dunpeal finally turned to look at her, the vivid golden glow in her corneas enough to mask her irises but not enough to erase the look of cold fury that was burning in their depths. Pearl's own eyes suddenly widened as she realized that the old pistol was now turned in her direction, aiming squarely for the center of her chest. "Hey, watch where you point that!"

"Was he worth it, little sister?" Coral demanded in a low tone, narrowing her eyes slightly. The gesture did very little to dampen the radiance in her eyes, the glow uniform enough to make them seem otherwise featureless. "You've said so many times before that you've never needed a man, and being the fool that I was I believed you. After all, surely my little sister wouldn't betray me, not after all that I've done for her over the years. Such a fool that I was, thinking I could trust you alone with him..."

"Coral, what are you talking about?" Pearl asked in an openly uneasy tone. "I haven't done anything to him. Just ask him," she added, casting a worried glance towards D. "Tell her, D," she urged him.

"Well, hunter?" Coral inquired gently, casting a neutral look towards D while still keeping the pistol aimed at Pearl's chest. "How was she?"

"She speaks the truth," D said calmly, maintaining an outward appearance of being perfectly composed. What he was feeling on the inside, however, was another matter entirely. He had expected the situation to have turned ugly at some point tonight, but he had thought it would have been between him and Coral once she came for him, not between Coral and Pearl. And certainly not one that looked ready to end in fratricide. "I have not touched her or have otherwise taken her virginity."

"Yet, you mean," Coral suggested ominously as she glanced back at Pearl. "Did I come down too early for you, then? I was wondering why Abby was so insistent that I stay in bed with her earlier. Am I not able to trust anyone anymore?" she sighed. "And Abby was such a good girl, too. How'd you do it, Pearl? How'd you get my darling little Abelyne to turn on me as well?"

"Sis, I haven't turned on you," Pearl replied carefully as she started to edge back, clearly horrified with the sudden change in Coral's demeanor. "I just came down here to talk to him, that's all. I haven't touched him..."

"Please," Coral scoffed quietly. "I saw you kissing him, all pressed up against his body like a wanton. You should have listened to D earlier, lying to others is such a no-no. Especially when you try to lie to me," she added darkly as she tightened her grip on the pistol.

"Coral, please..." Pearl whispered, keeping her hands up and open to show that she wasn't armed or a threat. She jerked suddenly as she backed into D, reflexively jumping forward a few inches only to hop back again as the motion put her dangerously close to the end of the flintlock pistol.

"So you haven't taken him, then?" Coral inquired, one eyebrow arching up. "Haven't popped your maidenhead on his manhood and felt his seed pop inside you in response?"

"No, I haven't," Pearl replied, shaking her head vehemently. "Sis..."

"I believe you," Coral said simply with a slight shrug, the aim of her pistol never wavering. "Oh, well, no matter. I've waited this long for him, I suppose I can wait another hour. Go ahead, you can take him first."

"What?" Pearl said, blinking hard enough to be heard. She cast a quick glance over her shoulder at D, finding an equally startled look on his face. "Coral, what the hell are you...?" she started to say before suddenly falling silent as a very ominous click was heard, the result of Coral's thumb cocking the pistol's hammer back into the firing position.

"I'm not going to wait all night," Coral said in a cold voice. "I know you want him, Pearl, so go ahead and take him before I lose my patience. You watched me several times before, so now it's my turn to sit back and see how much you've learned. He'll make it worth your while," she added, casting a dark glare towards D. "Won't you, hunter?"

"Coral..." Pearl managed to say in a bare whisper before her voice failed her, the realization finally sinking into her consciousness that her sister was indeed insane as D had tried to warn her.

Coral's glowing gaze returned to Pearl and seemed to grow even colder. "Take him," she ordered in a truly glacial tone that Pearl only rarely heard her use before, and never before towards her. It was the tone she used when she was indeed at the end of her limits, and more often than not blood had been shed in the moments following her icy words.

Pearl blinked hard and stared at her before slowly turning towards D, her whole body seeming to go numb in an instant. She looked up into his eyes to find him impassively gazing at her without the slightest hint of expression on his face, leaving her unable to fathom his thoughts. "D..." she said in a very quiet voice before briefly falling silent. Her lips started to move, but it took several tries for her to find her voice again. "Help me," she pleaded in a voice so soft that he almost didn't hear her.

"Coral," D spoke up, glancing over at the baroness. "I've no desire to take your sister's virginity. Given recent events, I'm not sure I even have the strength to do so anyway, so there's no point in forcing either of us to do something that nobody wants."

Coral snorted quietly in contempt. "She'll help you get it up," she said in a somewhat flat tone. "Granted she's never done such a thing before, but like I said, she's watched me enough times to have a general idea of how things are done. Try showing a little skin, Pearl," she suggested absently with a casual gesture of the pistol. "I know you're a little self-conscious about your figure, but he doesn't strike me as the kind to truly care what kind of shape you're in as long as you're nice and wet when he's ready for you."

"Coral..." Pearl started to say, half-turning to look at her.

"Quit stalling," Coral said darkly, bringing her right hand up to brace her left as she continued to keep the barrel centered on her sister's torso.

Pearl gave her a truly saddened look before sighing quietly in despair and turning to look at D. She paused as she noticed his expression change, first giving Coral a dark look before turning his head to give her a much gentler look of understanding and almost regret. "D?" she said very softly, trying to keep her voice low so that only he could hear her. "I don't know what to do," she breathed.

D simply shook his head to himself, briefly closing his eyes. "Sometimes none of the choices available are good ones," he murmured. "All you can do is be true to yourself. Listen to what your heart is telling you and do what you truly feel is the honorable thing to do, regardless of the price you might have to pay for it, for nobody can ever take your honor away from you."

She looked at him carefully for a moment before she reached up to touch him, very lightly running her fingertips across his jaw. "D... would you... be willing?" she finally said as a solitary tear formed in her eye.

He paused slightly and cast a quick glance over at Coral, not surprised to see that the baroness had barely moved. She had lowered her right hand, the one she had been using for stability, but her left hand continued to hold the pistol upright and aimed at her younger sister. It was hard to read her mood given the intensity of the vampiric glow in her eyes, but something told him that he would be allowed the chance to give Pearl what she had just asked for. As for what might happen after that, however...

You need to get this into your head, a ghostly voice said to him as it drifted up from the darkness of his memories. It had first spoken to him in a small cabin in the past, trying to help him deal with Leila and her pain, but the words seemed to apply just as well now. You can't bring emotional comfort to her unless you open yourself to her, and that is what you have to do if you truly want to help her. She's standing at a crossroads in her life, D, she needs to be shown what its like to have human emotions in her heart instead of only the bitter ashes of vengeance. You can show it to her because you've done it before, and it didn't kill you to do it! No, it actually made you stronger inside, D!

"D?" Pearl whispered, half in nervousness and half in fright as she saw his expression go blank for a number of moments.

Just think about it, the voice persisted as he refocused, reminding him that he had been trying to help Pearl earlier. Let her get past her anger first, D, then see if you can truly help her make something of her life...

"If that is what you truly wish," D found himself saying softly.

"D..." Pearl said before she suddenly took a deep breath. "I won't hurt you like my sister has. I won't force myself on you."

D looked at her for a moment before he gently shook his head, seeing his path crystalize in front of him in an instant. "You won't need to use force," he murmured quietly, causing her to blink hard. "As I said, all I ever wanted is to help you open your eyes, Pearl. You are already seeing differently now, seeing what honor is like and feeling the comfort it brings from knowing what you are doing is truly right. If you wish me to show you what it is like to open your human heart even further, to try to find that which can't be found by force but must be freely shared, then I would be... honored to help you."

She blinked again in surprise, silently digesting his words before she nodded once in understanding. She continued to study him silently before she very slowly leaned forward, brushing her lips against his in a hesitant kiss. She gently deepened the kiss after discovering not resistance, but the warmth of acceptance and understanding. "D, I'm sorry," she whispered once their lips broke apart.

"I have very few regrets in this life," D murmured back. "All are things that I have done, mostly out of ignorance, but they will nonetheless haunt me until the end. But do not think that I will regret helping you," he assured her in a very soft tone. "There is no dishonor in helping another when they have asked for help, nor is it dishonorable to ask for help when needed in such difficult and trying circumstances."

"Even like this?" she whispered softly, her aqua-blue eyes filled with more emotions than he could count. They closed a moment later as he craned his neck forward as best he could, very lightly brushing his lips against hers in a deliberate and unmistakable gesture. She seemed to shiver briefly before she calmed down and leaned into him, deepening the kiss and letting it persist for a number of moments.

"Even like this," he murmured once the kiss was broken.

"Do... do you truly want me?" she found herself asking quietly, feeling a gentle heat rising to her face. "After all that I've done to you?"

"In another time and place, Pearl," D explained quietly, casting a quick glance towards Coral to get an idea of just how patient she was going to be and how much time he had in which to try to comfort Pearl. The baroness seemed to be quite content to wait while he whispered softly to her sister, leaving him feeling more than a little worried about what she was thinking.

"As I said before," he continued, returning his focus to Pearl, "I would be more than willing to embrace you as a lover if you open your human heart to others, to cast aside your hate for life as a whole. I see that happening as we speak, and if my help can open your heart further..."

He fell silent as she reached up to press a pair of fingertips against his lips, the lone tear that had been forming in her eye finally slipping free to glide down her cheek. She leaned forward to brush her lips against his ear, ostensibly to kiss him again but whispering very softly so that Coral couldn't hear. "D, if we get out of this alive... would you... stay with me for.  
for awhile, to teach me about my... my human heart?"

"I would," he said softly without hesitation, knowing that indeed he would be willing to remain with her if she was starting to learn as he hoped. It was hardly the way he would have had preferred for her to be awakened to her human feelings, being betrayed at gunpoint by the one person in her life who meant the entire world to her. But life was like that, hardly fair and rarely gentle when it decided to teach you a lesson, and so he knew he had to make the best of his situation if he was to help her. And if that meant he had to make love to her with Coral standing over them both with a loaded pistol...

Pearl gasped softly as D bent his head down slightly, having to strain his entire body forward to an almost painful degree in order to be able to brush his lips against the soft curvature of her throat. She seemed to hesitate for a moment before she pressed herself against him, gently pushing him back until he didn't have to strain to reach her. She reached up to cradle his head, her fingertips sliding through his hair as he continued to kiss and caress her neck with his lips. Her own lips seemed to move of their own accord, brushing his temple for a few moments before she gently pushed herself away from him and took a step back.

D kept his eyes focused on hers as she untied the sash to her robe and slipped it off her shoulders. He waited until the material had slid to the floor in a heap before allowing himself to look down, aware of the look of deep uncertainty on her face at being so exposed to him. Her breasts were much like Abelyne's, shallow swells of super-soft flesh tipped with fairly large nipples. Discovering the sparse tuft of visibly blue hair that adorned her sheath was a bit of a surprise, given the extreme paleness of the rest of her hair, but it was something that could easily be passed off as just another genetic quirk of nature.

He brought his eyes back up to hers, feeling the faintest of twinges in his guts at the look on her face. Granted it was perfectly normal for a young woman to be embarrassed or abashed when she is naked before the eyes of others, but she most certainly shouldn't be forced into disrobing. But there was more to the look of unease in her eyes than discomfort with the situation...

"You're beautiful," D murmured quietly, a distant part of his mind making note of the way her expression promptly changed. Vampires and dunpeals could blush every bit as easily and as vividly as humans could, given the way their veins were structured, and were it not for the way the pointed tips of her ears took on a vibrant crimson tint he would have thought her no different than any other beautiful woman he had been in a position to compliment after being able to watch her undress.

"Thank you," she replied in an equally quiet tone as she moved forward to lean against him, still blushing fairly hard. She paused and cast the briefest of glances out of the corner of her eye towards Coral before she sighed and pressed her face against the junction of his shoulder and neck. "D... am I really beautiful, or are you just being nice to me?" she murmured.

His response was to tilt his head to the side and move his shoulder in a modified shrug, the best he could do to 'hold' her given the way his arms were still chained to the support columns. "Beauty is an acquired taste," he said gently. "I know you are shy because you feel your body isn't over-developed like many women, but you are who you are. Just between you and me?" he added in an even quieter tone, causing her to lift her head up to look at him. "I'm not impressed by over-development. As long as it does what it was designed to do efficiently, then size really doesn't matter at all. And yes, Pearl," he added with a measure of authority in his voice, seeking to reassure her. "You really are beautiful."

She gave him a look that seemed to be embarrassed amusement, a faint smile briefly touching her lips before she closed her eyes and returned her head to the crook of his shoulder. "Thank you," she whispered softly. She hesitated for a number of moments before she brought her hand up, lightly touching his chest. She used a very delicate touch to explore him, first tracing the dark outline of the bruise over his sternum before very slowly and gingerly letting her fingertips migrate downwards over the expanse of his abdomen.

He allowed his eyes to close at her touch, turning his focus inwards once again to control his body's responses. This time, however, instead of trying to stave off a reaction to stimulus he was allowing it to happen. That was not to say he was actively encouraging a state of arousal, as deep in his heart he knew that he didn't want things to happen this way, but he knew his conscience would be at ease if he tried to make the best of a bad situation and in what he felt was an honorable way.

His dark eyes opened again as she sighed softly, letting her lips tease his shoulder even as her fingertips teased his manhood. He tilted his head to rub his cheek against hers in a gentle motion, allowing her to hear his soft sigh as his blood warmed up. The sound seemed to draw her attention, causing her to open her eyes and look up at him with a faintly curious look.

"I'm not hurting you, am I?" she whispered as she massaged his hardness.

"Not this time," he assured her softly. He realized an instant later that he should have phrased it differently when a flicker of dark emotion crossed her face, a subtle but still pointed reminder of how she had grabbed and abused his flesh in the recent past. "Pearl, I didn't mean to..."

"It's alright," she whispered, shaking her head gently. "I... I know now that I was wrong, but hopefully... hopefully I can make it right now," she breathed as she leaned forward to kiss him gently. She deepened the kiss after a few seconds, savoring the warmth of the gesture before she brought her hand back up to his chest and very carefully molded her body against his.

A faint shiver ran down D's spine as he felt the heat of her sheath as she pressed against him, carefully capturing the tip of his manhood between her upper thighs so that he was almost but not quite rubbing against her directly. "D?" she whispered softly in his ear. "I'm... I've never done this before, so I might... need you to tell me what to do."

"You won't," D told her gently. "You just need to listen to what your body is telling you, that's all. Contrary to what you may think, you don't need to be taught anything. Things can be learned, granted, but your instincts are there for a reason. Trust them," he added softly.

She looked at him for a moment before nodding, leaning forward to kiss him yet again. The softest of sounds rose up from both their throats as she also moved her hips forward, just enough to press the tip of his manhood against the velvety folds of her sheath to part them slightly. "D..." she suddenly said in a low tone, seeming to forget how to breathe for a moment.

"Just relax, Pearl," he murmured quietly. He paused for a moment before he took a deep breath and cast a look towards Coral, making sure he had her attention before he gestured with his chin to the control levers. He kept his eyes on hers as she raised an eyebrow, giving him a look of cool amusement before she reached out with her free hand to make a grabbing motion.

Pearl nearly hit the roof as the lever clicked down without warning, the device having been activated by Coral's telekinetic power. The gears in the floor began to move as commanded, slowly tipping the support frame back from a vertical position to a horizontal one. She cast a quick glance around before she hopped forward slightly, just enough to balance her feet on the narrow edge of the frame bottom. It quickly became a minor scramble to retain her balance as her weight was tilted forward, forcing her to make a hasty adjustment to the placement of her hands and knees before she ended up squishing D beneath her weight. Even so, she still wound up on top of him in what most would call a compromising position.

She cast a brief sidelong glance out of her eye, more towards the levers than towards Coral, before sighing and looking back at D. "Sorry, I didn't mean to squash you like that," she apologized softly as she shifted positions. She blinked as she found herself pressed fairly hard against him, able to feel not just the warmth of his manhood pressed flat against her stomach but able to feel the subtle vibrations as it pulsed in time with his heartbeat.

"All things considered, Pearl, I wouldn't worry about it," D replied in a dry tone, giving her a look that was mostly neutral but still contained a small hint of ironic amusement. It was enough to allay her concerns, resulting in a small smile as she rose up on her knees and straddled him. She then paused as she glanced down, trying to get an idea of how exactly she was supposed to do things.

"D?" she asked quietly as she glanced up at him.

"Listen to your body," D replied softly. "I can't really do anything like this. That's not a bad thing, if you think about it," he added, causing her to blink fairly hard.

"Umm... why?" she asked as she very gingerly settled her weight down, still keeping one eye on where she was at so she wouldn't squish anything.

"You'll be in total control the entire time," D explained calmly. "I know it may be difficult for you, seeing how you haven't done anything like this before, but you will be able to go at your own pace. Like I said, just listen to what your body is telling you."

She nodded as she reached down, gently taking hold of his manhood. She ran her thumbs along the vein on the underside for several moments before she glanced back up at him. "I heard it hurts at first," she whispered.

"Only at first, and only if you're not careful," he said, having dealt with his fair share of first-time lovers before. "Just don't worry about it, okay? As I said, you will be in control and can go at your own pace."

"Alright," she replied softly with a somewhat hesitant nod. She glanced down at the way she was holding him and adjusted herself accordingly, scooting forward slightly. She then held him steady as she rose up on her knees, making absolutely sure everything was where she wanted to be before she very gingerly began to settle her weight back down.

He wasn't sure what it was that caused him to hold his breath as he felt himself press against her, acutely aware of how warm and inviting she suddenly seemed to be. There was the usual moment of resistance before her labia parted around him, allowing him to carefully enter her most sacred of gardens. A soft gasp of surprised delight rose up from her chest at the sensation, her cautious movements coming to a brief halt before resuming once more. She continued to settle her weight around him, slowly easing him inside her at a pace that was surprisingly erotic despite the near-glacial speed. The steady motion came to an abrupt halt as the tension registered on both their senses, the pressure and feeling of his flesh encountering a barrier of sorts.

Their eyes immediately locked on one another, seeming to communicate on a wordless level before she took a deep breath and very carefully started to rock her hips back and forth in a very subtle rhythm, barely moving him at all. He nodded to her as he realized what she was doing, seeking to stretch her hymen to the breaking point instead of simply puncturing it with brute force. It was something he had tried to do in the past on those rare occasions when he would be the first for a woman, but he had never been able to get it 'right' without slipping too deeply with the wrong amount of gentle force at some point.

She suddenly tensed as her hips moved a little farther than intended, a brief spasm of pain crossing her face. Her mouth opened slightly as if in a silent gasp before she very slowly exhaled. She gave him a somewhat uncertain look before she began to move again, her irises visibly widening as she found that the resistance was gone and he was allowed to slide deeper inside her. She continued to ease herself forward until her groin was fully against his, a look of absolute wonder forming on her face as she realized that he was now completely inside her.

"D?" she breathed, her voice barely more than a faint whisper.

"Not what you expected it to be like, is it?" he murmured softly, giving her a gentle look. The pleasure of being within her was exquisite, perhaps even more so than usual. He started to wonder why that was before abruptly emptying his mind of the thoughts, knowing that now was not the time for idle speculation. Nor, for that matter, did he want to start looking for an answer that he probably wouldn't want to find to begin with. Ignorance is bliss, as the saying went, and in this case it truly didn't matter why.

She shook her head gently before taking a deep breath and lifting herself up slightly, just enough to ease most of his length out of her. She stopped at the last possible moment, leaving just the tip of him lodged within before she began to settle her weight around him again. "Oohhhh," she breathed as her eyes seemed to close of their own accord. "D, this is... wonderful..."

D cast a quick glance at Coral, feeling his blood chill at the utterly impassive and unreadable look on her face. The glow was still present in her eyes, giving her a somewhat hellish cast as she silently watched her sister make love to him. With her expression blank like that, D wasn't able to tell what was going through her mind, which only made him all the more wary of what her unbalanced mind was making of the situation. Or how she would react once it was over...

He mentally blinked as he felt his body already starting to respond to Pearl's slow and hesitant movements, a slow sensation of pressure starting to build in his groin. He wasn't quite sure why he was reacting so quickly, but it was a response he thought it was best to stave off for as long as possible. He was fairly sure that Pearl was vividly aware of how short a time her would-be rapist had spent up in the hayloft with Coral, and given the stories that he himself was all too aware of circulating about his 'skill' in bed he knew he had not just a reputation to protect but an expectation to meet. He had little concern for what others thought of him personally, as he was who he was, but given the circumstances and the fact that he was doing this to help Pearl, he felt that he also had the moral obligation to ensure that her first time would not be a disappointment in any way.

Remember, the playful voice from his past rose up to whisper in his ear with a truly impish smile that he could almost physically see before his very eyes, Slowly to do it right, and doing it for the right reasons...

With his wrists and ankles chained to the support columns with almost no slack whatsoever, there was very little for D to do aside from hold perfectly still, breathe carefully, and enjoy the feeling of Pearl's sheath sliding up and down the full length of his manhood at a measured pace. Her breath seemed to be tangled in her throat as she moved, producing an odd rasping noise as she struggled to keep herself from making the same kind of almost guttural noises that she had heard Coral make when she had watched her those few times.

"Pearl?" D spoke up softly as he noticed the pace start to pick up, the gentle rolls and thrusts of her hips now becoming moderate stabbing motions as she continued to impale herself on him. "Take it easy, there's no rush."

"D..." she whispered, leaning forward to brace her hands on either side of him. She didn't pause or cease her motions in the slightest, continuing to work herself into a lustful frenzy of passion and pleasure. "I... I can't... help it... my... my body... wants... oh, god..."

He simply nodded in understanding, momentarily oblivious to the fact that she couldn't see the gesture with her eyes closed like that. The first time was usually rough on the body, both hormones and pleasure senses running amok with unrestrained and reckless abandon as they were freed from the bonds of frustration that had held them in check up until this point. He knew he had pretty much lost all control himself when he had taken Doris, wondering long afterwards how he had managed to avoid killing her in that lustful frenzy of thrusts and withdrawals. And that had been after centuries of celibacy and no small amount of sexual frustration from his adamant denial of his body's most basic needs and instincts...

"D... oh, god, D..." Pearl gasped as her pace increased to an almost frantic degree, making him suddenly worry about acquiring a case of friction-burn from her rapid motions.

"Relax, Pearl," he managed to say as calmly as he could before her passion didn't so much break as explode with an almost violent force. He blinked as the full-body shiver visibly tore through her, the sudden spasming of her inner muscles catching him by surprise. He wasn't sure if it was simple biological synergy or a psychological reflex but his own orgasm suddenly surged to break the control of his willpower, causing him to flood her sheath with what little life-energy he had been able to regenerate since his encounter with Coral.

The world took on a distinctly gray cast for several moments afterwards, his senses blurred into uselessness before finally recovering to the point of allowing him to process information once again. Pearl was collapsed on top of him, making it extremely difficult for him to breathe properly. The sudden impact of her body's weight on his chest, light as she was, had also worsened the damage caused by her fist earlier. He wasn't sure if something was broken or was merely fractured again, but the searing pain that was radiating from his upper chest was definitely not a good sign.

"Pearl..." he gasped softly, his voice sounding dangerously weak.

"Re..." she puffed, not bothering to try to lift her head up from his chest as she struggled to breathe, "Relax... my... ass... Oh, god, D..."

He gave up trying to get her to move for the moment and turned his focus inward, listening to what his own body was telling him. The pain in his chest was already starting to abate slightly, suggesting that he had only irritated a previous fracture in either his sternum or ribs. His lungs felt okay, but breathing was still difficult with her weight pressing down on him like that.  
A truly fierce ache was starting up in his groin, suggesting that he had been abused just a little bit past his tolerances. Normally that wouldn't be too much of a concern for him, but with the situation being what it was...

"So what do you think?" Coral spoke up calmly, suddenly reminding both D and Pearl that she had been there and watching the entire time. Her hands were clasped behind her back almost casually with her head tilted just slightly, as if she were studying something of idle or remote interest.

"Oh, god, sis..." Pearl whispered as she slowly pushed herself up into a kneeling position, still keeping D delightfully ensconced within her. Her body seemed to shiver hard again as she sighed, finally opening her eyes to reveal the vivid crimson highlights of her vampiric side. Unlike previous times her corneas had lit up with raw emotion, the glow this time was soft and seemed to burn with gentle warmth instead of raging anger.

"That's about what I said after my first time," Coral said, keeping her voice perfectly calm and composed. "Definitely something to smile about for the rest of your life, don't you think?"

Pearl paused before she glanced down at D, studying the look on his face. "Yes, it is," she said very softly as a gentle smile formed on her lips. The smile lasted for a few seconds before her eyes suddenly widened at the sharp and unmistakable twanging sound of a crossbow being fired.

D was unable to stop the startled gasp of horror that rose from his throat as the tip of a crossbow bolt erupted from the center of Pearl's bare chest, sending a wide spray of blood arcing into the air. "Pearl!" he cried out as he felt the sticky warmth splatter across his chest, unable to tear his eyes away from the metal protrusion marring her smooth skin.

"Well, at least you enjoyed it," Coral said calmly as she lowered Pearl's antique crossbow, her eyes fixed on the feathered end of the bolt sticking out from Pearl's back. Blood pulsed out from both ends of the wound, a thick wave flowing out with every rapid beat of her heart to quickly coat the lower half of both her body and D's in a thin crimson veil.

Pearl blinked once and looked at D, her face seeming to be frozen in a mask of surprise. She started to move her lips, a thin trickle of blood oozing out of the corner of her mouth with a soft gurgle as her lungs failed to push enough air over her vocal chords to let her speak. Stop her, she mouthed in eerie silence before she twitched once. The pulsing of the wounds abruptly ceased a moment later, leaving her sitting perfectly still and motionless. She seemed to try to say something else when the crimson light vanished from her eyes as if a switch had been thrown.

D's blood seemed to be a solid wall of ice, refusing to flow in his veins as he watched Pearl slump to the side and into a motionless heap. Her blood continued to seep from the chest wound but not with any internal force, telling him that her heart muscle had stopped. It took him a moment to wrench his gaze from Pearl's body and focus on Coral, all too aware of the extreme danger he was now in.

"I told you he was mine," Coral whispered softly as she set the crossbow aside and picked up her pistol. "I told you that in the beginning. I made you a deal, I'd let you have Celene if you let me have D. And my plan worked," she breathed as she moved over to the row of control levers.

D didn't dare interrupt her soft monologue, knowing that either one of two things was about to happen. Either she would try to take him next to fulfill her vision of having a child, or she would simply kill him. In either case, he knew that his chances of survival were essentially non-existent now. After all, if Coral's madness could turn against her own sister like that, how little would it take to jar her mind into turning against him just as easily?

"I told you I wanted a child," Coral murmured as she pulled the center lever, slowly bringing the frame back into a vertical position. She seemed to be oblivious to the way Pearl's body was sent tumbling to the floor, the metal tip of the bolt protruding from her chest making a hollow ringing sound as it struck the metal flooring. "And I told you I wanted his child. So why'd you do it, Pearl? Why did you come down here to take him tonight? Why?" she said as she turned to face the frame, almost pleading with the open air.

"You knew I was ready tonight!" she cried out in anguish, gesturing with the pistol. "I told you myself I would be ready! And even if you didn't hear me, how could you miss what your own body was telling you? You know our cycles are timed together, so you had to be ready too! Could you not have waited a single month? Couldn't you have waited until he had given me a child before asking to have your own?"

D blinked hard as Coral whirled and yanked the lever on the right from his vantage point. The tunnel beneath his feet spiraled open to expose the dark void of the canyon floor below. He felt his throat constrict as Pearl's body was sent tumbling into the open air, unable to breathe or move or even think as he watched her plummet into the abyss and finally disappear from view.

"You betrayed me, Pearl," Coral whispered softly, seeming to be trying not to sob to herself. "I'm your sister, I've shared with you everything I've ever had. Everything. All you had to do was ask and be patient. But you didn't. You... of all people, you betrayed me. Why, D?" she asked as she finally looked up at him, a lone tear trickling down her cheek. "Why did she do it?"

He remained silent as she returned the lever to the upright position, once again sealing the lava tunnel and cutting off the view of the darkened canyon. "I know you came inside her," she said in a low tone as she suddenly raised the pistol, aiming at his blood-spattered chest as she slowly approached. "I saw the way you shuddered when she came. You gave to her what you should have gave to me. She was just as ready as I am, you know, our cycles have been in synch with one another since she first bled. You just gave her a child, D."

"She's dead, Coral," D said quietly.

"Yes, I know," Coral replied in a broken whisper as she finally reached him, the muzzle of her pistol barely an inch away from the center of his chest. "My darling little sister... is gone. Father should be glad to see her, so it's not that bad. And she took her baby with her," she added in a dark tone as her grip on the pistol tightened.

"I wanted to be the one to present him with his first grandchild," she spat in a steely tone, the vivid glow of vampiric rage returning to her pale yellow eyes. "Rose would never sully herself with a child, and no girl would have been stupid enough to lay with his bastard sons unless she had been tied down or drugged first. That just left me and Pearl, and Pearl was too young!"

"She wasn't a child," D replied softly.

"She's my baby sister," Coral hissed. "I'm supposed to watch out for her and take care of her. I trusted you, D, I trusted in your honor not to hurt her. And now look what happened," she said as she made a gesture to the blood coating him. "You took her virginity and she bled all over you. You were supposed to be gentle with her, but you made her bleed!"

"Coral..." D said as he instinctively tensed, sensing that she was about to lose control. And if she did with that pistol still pointed at him...

"You hurt her!" she raged at him, her lips pulled back to expose her tiny dunpeal fangs. "You hurt my sister! You hurt Pearl! I can't forgive you for that, hunter! I just can't!"

((D!)) it suddenly yelled, startling them both. ((The brace! NOW!))

Time seemed to grind to a perfect halt for one agonizing moment, as if a single grain of the Sands of Time had become jammed in the hourglass just as it began to fall. D and Coral glanced at one another for the briefest of instants before the world began to move once again, D suddenly putting his entire being behind a fierce tug on his left wrist as he sought to break the screws that bound him and Coral taking a startled leap back before bringing her right hand up to brace the flintlock pistol as she took aim at him.

The explosive sound was the first thing that fully registered on his mind, not the concussive blast of gunpowder being ignited by a spark but rather the rasping sound of metal giving way to a superior force, the iron threads of the screws being shorn off and stripped of their ability to hold. Then the pain set in, first the bruising sensation of his wrist slamming against the inside of the adamantium band, then the sharper and more distinct agony of his wrist snapping from the pressure even as the screws yielded to the force.

In the split-second that followed, D realized that he had lost his gambit. Surely with his wrist broken, the nerves would be all but paralyzed by the pain and thus unable to function properly. His left arm was free now, but there was simply nothing useful he could do with it. And even if he had options, he knew that there was maybe half a millimeter of pull left in the trigger as Coral's finger continued to pull back.

In that instant he saw his life flash before his eyes, an odd phenomenon many humans had insisted they experienced when confronted with certain death. He could hear a soft fragment of song as his mother hummed to him, a gentle and delightful melody as she tucked him into bed. He saw her smile gently at him, her face becoming replaced by the enraged visage of his father as he held her body on the palace steps, screaming as no living entity should ever scream. A blade flashed before his vision, cutting through vampire after vampire to leave an ocean of blood in his wake. Doris looked at him through tearful eyes as her robe parted, still damp from her shower and whispering that she loved him. He then heard Leila's voice in his ear, whispering the same words as he continued to make slow and gentle love to her. And then...

He blinked hard as his arm continued to move forward, no doubt because of simple inertia but seemingly beyond his control now. His fist suddenly opened, his fingers spreading wide as he reached forward to grab the barrel of her pistol as the hammer moved, slipping free from the catch to slam down into the flint-pan and sending a cascade of sparks into the mass of black powder. Had there been enough time to do so he would have blinked again as he suddenly felt the thing in his hand open up, clamping its mouth around the barrel and biting down hard just as the powder ignited.

The end of the barrel compressed into a thin flat line just as the back half of the pistol exploded, the mixture of ammonium nitrate and charcoal that D occasionally used for small-scale and controlled pyrotechnics being far too powerful to be used as a substitute for gunpowder. The expansion of hot gasses would have propelled the bullet forward nonetheless had there been any place for it to vent, but with the barrel now effectively crimped shut between the symbiot's teeth the concussive force only had one outlet.

Even though the blast was directed away from him there was still enough force to send D flying backwards against the padded surface, slamming his left arm against the adamantium support structure hard enough to crack another bone. He flinched by pure reflex, closing his eyes to protect them from the sudden grit and dust in the air as the pressure wave compressed his chest hard enough to empty his lungs. It took an incredible amount of willpower to not inhale an instant later, waiting in breathless agony for the worst of the blast to fade before trying to breathe once again. The amount of smoke and soot in the air immediately triggered a series of extremely painful coughs, wracking his chest with spasms like so many lightning bolts driving into his core.

He finally managed to open his eyes, looking around for what would no doubt be Coral's return strike once she recovered. He blinked as he realized that no such attack would ever be coming, finding her flat on her ass with her robe blown completely open to expose her slender body. Normally he wouldn't have paid the slightest attention to such a trivial detail, but he found he couldn't tear his eyes away from her bare breasts. The soft and gentle swells of her feminine flesh rose and fell as she breathed, neatly framing the small and perfectly circular hole that had been blown into the skin directly over her heart. Blood oozed from the wound at a horrific rate, pulsing in a rhythmic cascade as Pearl's life-blood had done barely a minute ago.

"Coral!" he called out to her, his voice so raw and raspy as to barely be much of a voice at all.

Coral tilted her head to the side and slowly raised her left hand, staring at the furrow that had been blasted in the metal implant by the explosion. The rest of the flesh of her hand was little more than a ruin, dripping blood onto the floor at a steady pace to form a small pool. Even as she watched, the odd metal seemed to shake and shiver before it fell free from her skin to clatter on the ground.

"D?" she gurgled softly, a bright pink froth starting to form on her lips. The sight was enough to cause D to grimace, knowing that the exploding bullet had likely grazed her heart before puncturing a lung. The odds of that had to have been on the order of seven digits or higher, given the way she was holding the pistol, but he also know that exploding metal tended to go in all sorts of random directions.

"Coral, just... don't move," he called out as best he could, knowing that there might still be a chance to save her. He paused as he noticed just how much blood was forming around her, realizing that whatever help he might have been able to offer her if he had been fully unbound might still not have been enough to save her life.

"I... still want... my baby..." Coral rasped as her eyelids started to droop. Her left hand fell to her side, landing in the puddle of blood next to her to scatter droplets in a shallow arc all around. "Why... couldn't... you... love... me..."

D couldn't speak even if he wanted to, his whole body sagging as he felt the last of his strength draining away from him. His chest hurt, his arm hurt, his wrist hurt, his ankles hurt, and he was tired. So tired...

"Pearl... my... sister..." Coral whispered as she leaned back, resting against the wall and fully closing her eyes. "Pearl... I need... you. D... Pearl... I... love... you..."

It was all he could do to keep his own eyes open as the pulsing wound in Coral's chest suddenly became still, the pool of blood around her ceasing to expand several moments later. He realized then that it was over, that he was free of both her and Pearl and wouldn't need to worry about them ever again. It was over now, so surely he could rest... surely he could... rest...

He didn't have the strength to glance up as he heard footsteps running down the stairs and into the room. "D!" April called out in open worry as she started to charge into the room only to come to a dead halt. "Oh, my god. ABBY!" she yelled back towards the stairs in a panic.

((D, hold still,)) it said in a muted tone. ((This is going to hurt, so just hold your breath for me, okay? One, two, three!))

A jolt of white-hot pain seared through his arm as the fractured bones in his wrist were reset, bringing them back into proper alignment. The blinding veil of pain fell away several moments later, leaving him feeling just a tiny bit better and even more tired than before. "Thank you," he managed to murmur as the world became gray once more.

"D!" April blurted out as she ran to his side, her eyes wide with horror as she saw that he was covered in blood. "Please don't die on me! Oh, god," she whimpered. "ABBY!" she screamed again.

"What? What?" Abelyne said in a panic as she scampered down the stairs as fast as she could. She darted into the room and almost literally skidded to a stop as she realized what had panicked April so much. "Oh, shit! CORAL!"

((Coral's dead,)) it spoke up quietly, causing April to jerk back at the reminder of its presence. ((Coral and Pearl both.))

"D, please tell me you're alright," April whimpered as she tentatively reached out to touch his arm.

((He won't be if you don't get us out of here,)) it warned as it cast an openly worried look up at D. ((He's exhausted, and I mean totally out of energy this time. You've got to get us unchained and find a place in the ground to bury him so he can start to regenerate. Abelyne?)) it called out in a louder voice.

"Coral?" Abelyne said in a sickened voice as she carefully knelt down and picked up the baroness' right hand. "Coral, please... wake up. Coral?"

"Abby, where's the tools?" April called out as she began to frantically search the dungeon for the special tools that could undo the titanium screws without destroying anything.

"Coral?" Abelyne repeated as a single tear started to well up.

"Abby, listen," April said as she came over and squeezed the flaxen-haired girl's bare shoulder. "Coral's dead. We're free now, do you understand? We aren't slaves anymore, he rescued us!" she whispered fiercely. "Just like he said he would! Now we have to help him get out of here!"

"D?" Abelyne sniffled as she edged back and slowly stood up, turning to give him a heart-rending look. "Did you have to kill her? I know she was a good woman and I know she loved me..."

"D?" April blurted out as D's eyes closed and he seemed to quit breathing. The world became a darker shade of gray after that, broken only by the sound of April's voice calling his name, trying to keep him anchored to the realm of the living instead of letting him quietly slip into the abyss where two of his sisters had just gone.

Sisters? he found himself thinking before everything went dark. Yes, we were all related. Bound in blood, the blood of vampires. And as always, it seemed to end in violence, death, and destruction. And blood, always blood...

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The air was deathly still as D opened his eyes again, slowly looking up to focus on the ceiling above him. An eternity passed before he could find the strength he needed to turn to his side, gazing at the horrified and saddened look of his beloved bride. He felt his stomach twist into a knot as her eyes finally rose up to meet him, the liquid-like coloring seeming to be even more liquid than usual as they brimmed with sorrowful tears.

"So tell me how it ended," Galen finally whispered, closing her eyes once as she hugged him tighter. "How you survived and freed them from the bonds of slavery."

The air above him remained still before he finally drew a deep enough breath to speak again. "At that point, they were already free," he murmured. "Coral and Pearl were dead, and there were no other nobles to lay claim to them as slaves. They found the tools and unchained me, carrying me out of that underground lair and over to the village a good mile or so away. They buried me in a corner of a farmer's field and covered me with straw so that nobody would know of my condition. I awoke the following day to Abelyne's touch, as she knew I needed blood and offered me some of hers. I couldn't refuse her, as I was simply too weak and was still bound by Leila's promise. I took as little as I could, knowing she had recently fed Coral, but even so it left her half-conscious and barely able to stand.

"April found us an hour later and moved us into a room at the inn she had rented. It took two days for my ankles to heal enough to where I could walk, but she insisted I spend a third day with her to finish resting. She hardly left my side at all, taking care of and watching over both myself and Abelyne until she was convinced that we were both alright. Word had finally spread of Coral's death in the village, and most of the last day was spent meeting with village officials to discuss what they were to do from that point on.

"April and Abelyne eventually agreed to stay in the village for a time to help with the fall harvest, as the winter months were not too far away, but they both said they intended to leave the village come spring to find a new place to continue their lives. The village that night had a... I won't call it a celebration, given the deep level of concerns from the village elders of future events, but there was still a sense of relief following the fall of the castle and the end of the Winters barony.

"I would have left that night had April not bade me to remain, to at least keep her company until the sun rose if not to take part in the festivities of the others. It was that last night that she came to me..."

He fell silent as Galen reached up to squeeze his hand gently, carefully rolling onto her side to give him a tender kiss. The gesture was more than a little comforting, despite his thoroughly dark and haunted mood, and soon he found some the tension being drained away by the simple power of her love.

"You can tell me," she murmured quietly as she rested her head on his shoulder. "I know you've had several lovers in your past, and I know that it won't change my love for you. It's alright, D."

"The white moon was full that night," D found himself saying in a soft, almost withdrawn tone. "It was low on the horizon when she drew the shutters back and opened the window to let the cool twilight air inside the room. The light of the moon remained when she turned the lights out, giving her body an almost ethereal glow. She decided she liked it and left the window open as she undressed and whispered to me, thanking me for saving her and Abelyne. I saw the cut she had made earlier to share her blood with me, and she bade me to drink from her again. I accepted," he added simply.

"Hence the 'moon-kissed' nickname?" she murmured softly.

D nodded absently to himself. "We spoke of many things during those three days while I healed, and learning she knew of the ancient Druidic language was simply one of them. I believe her parents may have been druids, or at least people who still followed in their beliefs. Regardless of her past, I talked to both her and Abelyne about what their lives would be like from that point on, free from the controlling influence of the Winters family and how they then could do whatever it was they wanted to do and become whomever they wanted to be. The last traces of Coral's influence had left Abelyne by the second day, returning her to the cheerful young girl that she had been before becoming enthralled by the hypnotic illusion of Coral's 'love' for her.

"I have no idea what became of the implant," he added softly. "April said that Coral's body had turned to ash the following day, but that the damaged metal of her implant had vanished. I made a brief stop to look for it after I left the inn to continue my journey, but neither I nor... it... could sense any trace of the alien metal. I tried to remember the sigils I had seen and write them down, but my memories were... not reliable enough. I eventually gave up and continued down the road, stopping only to ensure that nobody would be able to make use of their underground dungeon ever again and that my pain would be the last the adamantium chains would ever see."

Galen made a soft noise to herself as she squeezed his arm again, still resting her head on his shoulder. "D..." she started to say before falling silent, not sure if she truly wished to speak of the matter. She blinked hard as she felt the faintest of twitches inside her, reminding her that she was six-months pregnant with a child. Her child, and D's...

She glanced up as he moved slightly, twisting around to look at her with an unreadable expression. His eyes remained on hers for what seemed like a minor eternity before his gaze finally dropped to the swelling of her abdomen. His hand moved over to rest on her belly, his fingertips barely brushing her skin as he felt for himself the tiny twitches of movement that were coming from within the sanctity of her womb.

"I never wanted a child," D whispered, causing her to blink hard and her blood to turn deathly cold. "Not before then, and certainly not afterwards. My life up until now has been... one of destruction, one of death. I saw no future for me or my kind, and so I saw no purpose in trying to extend that dark and hopeless future for another generation."

"So why did you finally say yes to me?" Galen asked softly. "What was it that made you turn your back on thousands of years of death and your quest to purge the world of our blood? Why did you decide to marry me in blood, to tie your fate and future to my own? Why did you ultimately give me a child, D?"

D sighed softly and closed his eyes, leaning back against the pillow as he absently hugged his bride closer. "You're different, Galen," he murmured. "Of all the dunpeals I have ever met, you are the only one who seemed to be capable of caring about others. Truly caring about both kin and strangers, humans and mutants and vampires and all else. You made me realize that... that there was still hope, that what burned inside me wasn't just a unique flaw or fluke of humanity but was something that could be... copied," he whispered.

She remained silent for some time afterwards, simply holding his hand in hers as she rested against him. "D," she finally said. "What about Pearl?"

D opened his eyes and glanced at her, feeling a twinge inside at the look on her face. "Perhaps I could have saved her," he replied softly, almost too softly for her to hear. "Perhaps she did have the same potential I had, to rise up above the burning rage of her father's blood and come to embrace the emotions and feelings of her human mother's blood. I don't know, and I don't think I ever will know. I regret her death, but part of the pain is offset by the knowledge that she didn't suffer and that she died... happy, for once in her life."

"And if... if you had given her a child?" she asked.

He frowned slightly at the question, knowing that she knew full well it was purely an academic question. "I don't know," he repeated. "Galen... why do you ask me this?"

She sighed and seemed to curl up into a ball, drawing her knees up as best she could given the bulk of her swollen abdomen. "D... please tell me that I didn't push you into this," she whispered, her voice starting to break around the edges with emotion. "That I didn't make you feel like you had to give me a child to shut me up."

"No."

Galen blinked hard at his tone, looking up to find a stern resolve in his eyes as he looked down at her. "Galen," he started to say before giving her a somewhat level look. "I'm... I'm insulted that you felt you had to ask that. Yes, for all my life I wanted only to end the curse of our blood and rid the world of it once and for all, and until recently I would have found it to be unconscionable to have done what I have done only to turn around and willfully father a child.

"But you showed me I was wrong," he persisted in a gentler tone. "Meeting you and watching how you acted, being with you for years like this, proved to me that you are not dominated by your blood as the others were. That made me realize that there was hope for us, for the dark blood that flows in our veins. Yes, I still view it as cursed and I will still hold myself to our promise in blood to end your life if you willingly do harm to others as the rest of our kind has done throughout history, but not once since I met you have you given me reason to suspect I will ever have to do so. And I trust I have likewise not given you reason to contemplate fulfilling your half of the promise?" he added with a faintly uneasy look.

A soft smile crossed her face for a brief moment. "So far you have not, my love," she murmured as she leaned forward to kiss him gently. She paused and lifted her head up to stare into his eyes, her own starting to twinkle with faint amusement. "I suspect I will be calling for your death as punishment once I go into labor and the pain overwhelms me, but I've been assured that it is a natural impulse among women to blame their husbands for their condition during childbirth."

"So I've heard," D replied in a perfectly neutral tone, prompting a soft giggle from her. The moment of humor quickly passed and the look of pain and sorrow returned to her eyes, seeming to taint their blue-green depths in a way that bothered D greatly. "D..."

"As I told Pearl," he said quietly, "I would rather see my own life ended than be forced to do something unwillingly. I did not try to give you a child when you first asked me to because I didn't believe it was right, but again, being with you for so long has made me truly examine myself and my life. If I didn't believe I could live with my decision, mine and yours together, then I would not have allowed myself to run the risk of giving you a child. I would have been afraid for a child in the arms of a woman like Coral... but I have no fear of what my... of what our child will be like in your arms."

"Thank you," she whispered as she turned away from him, squeezing his hand tightly as the tears started to fall. She would have held onto him and cried into his shoulder had she not known that tears burned him just as easily as holy water did. The reminder of his description of what had happened to him earlier in his life made her shudder, trying not to imagine just how badly he had been hurt during his ordeal. "Dammit," she muttered darkly as more tears continued to well up and glide down her cheeks. "I'm sorry about this, it must be the..."

She fell silent as he curled his arm up, gently rolling her back over to him and resting her head against his bare shoulder. She quickly reached up to wipe the tears away as they fell, knowing that they were burning him and taking a deep measure of comfort from his willingness to put her emotional pain above his physical pain. She still didn't want to hurt him like that, even by pure accident, but the emotional comfort was still something she couldn't deny. A human need, she found herself thinking. To hold and be held...

"D?" she murmured softly. "I love you."

She closed her eyes as he rolled over onto his side to face her, wrapping both his arms around her and giving her that soft, tender, unique kind of kiss that always melted her heart like so much warm butter. "And I love you," he whispered back. Nothing more needed to be said after that as they simply held one another tightly, bound not just by the blood shared between them but by the deeper ties of love that only human hearts could truly grasp and welcome.

THE END

This story has been reformatted to play nice with fanfic's web engine.  
The original story format can be found on my webpage at:  
www dot sailormoonv dot net slash forsaken dot htm 


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